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3.8 AVERAGE
3.8 AVERAGE
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Heather wrote in her author's note that she wrote this book not for the women to be remembered but for them to be known (they need to be known before they can be remembered). I'm sure I'm not alone in saying that I had no idea about the p.o.w in the Pacific during ww2 and this group of incredible women. I'm so glad I got to know their story.
My only criticism is the story didn't seem to flow amazingly and it was stop start with different women so it was hard to keep up with everything and everyone.
There's many unsung heroes throughout history and more books like this should be written to shine a light on those who have wrongly been left in the shadows and finally give them a voice that needs to be heard.
My only criticism is the story didn't seem to flow amazingly and it was stop start with different women so it was hard to keep up with everything and everyone.
There's many unsung heroes throughout history and more books like this should be written to shine a light on those who have wrongly been left in the shadows and finally give them a voice that needs to be heard.
Content Warnings
Graphic: War
Moderate: Confinement, Death, Medical content, Grief, Murder
3.5… while I liked this book, it didn’t hold my attention or make me care as much as the Tattooist of Auschwitz. You are thrown into a story that for me I had no idea what had happened historically or what was the meaning behind the current state of things. As I got into the story, I found that there were a few different story lines that I was confusing. It ended as happily as it could and opened my eyes to very real events that I never knew had happened. It was another amazing telling of survival and creating family not bound by blood but out of necessity.
hopeful
informative
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
It provided information about women, mainly Australian nurses, who were captured and sent to prison camps during WWII. It shows their compassion and commitment to all the women in the camp. They were gutsy ladies that stood their ground against the person in charge many times. Based on really people
I had a tough time staying invested in this book, primarily due to the large cast of characters and the changing of POVs multiple times in the same chapter. These women had extreme strength for what they went through and through music found their way through their imprisonment. The authors note was the best part of the book!
emotional
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
N/A
Heather Morris’s newest book follows two sisters and a group of Australian nurses through their time as prisoners of Japan during WWII. I appreciate Ms Morris’s dedication to tell the stories no one else does. These are the stories we need to know about.
challenging
emotional
informative
inspiring
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I really enjoyed Heather Morris' earlier novels and was looking forward to learning more about a time in history that I knew little about. In this instalment, we follow passengers fleeing Singapore in the midst of WWII to escape the Japanese invasion. A few days into the voyage, the ship is bombed and the survivors seek refuge on a remote Indonesian island. There they are captured and held in various POW camps for years, fighting the weather, illness, starvation, and brutality.
I listened to the audiobook for this one and I think that heavily impacted my overall thoughts and feelings. The narrator was good but I struggled to distinguish the different voices and she had a habit of not leaving line breaks between paragraphs which meant I often had to stop and work out what was happening as the story had moved in a different direction.
The coverage of the event itself was well-researched and documented, however, it felt a lot more like 'this happened and then this' unlike The Tattooist of Auschwitz for example, which had a much better flow. It read more like a memoir than historical fiction. I hate to say it, and I imagine this is because we're fairly desensitized to war with the myriad of books and films that now saturate the market, but I was quite bored a lot of the time. That's not to say that what these women went through was easy; quite the polar opposite. I just didn't feel a connection to any of the characters and wasn't as engaged with the story as I have been with others in the past.
I did love the parts about the voice choir which was also the best part about the audio as it actually played a recording of the hymn and Bolero which gave me goosebumps. And of course, I shed many a tear at the end.
I definitely learned a lot and for that I am grateful to Heather Morris for bringing another true story to life. It just wasn't written in a way that I could fully engage with.
Thank you to NetGalley for sending me a digital copy in exchange for an honest review.
I listened to the audiobook for this one and I think that heavily impacted my overall thoughts and feelings. The narrator was good but I struggled to distinguish the different voices and she had a habit of not leaving line breaks between paragraphs which meant I often had to stop and work out what was happening as the story had moved in a different direction.
The coverage of the event itself was well-researched and documented, however, it felt a lot more like 'this happened and then this' unlike The Tattooist of Auschwitz for example, which had a much better flow. It read more like a memoir than historical fiction. I hate to say it, and I imagine this is because we're fairly desensitized to war with the myriad of books and films that now saturate the market, but I was quite bored a lot of the time. That's not to say that what these women went through was easy; quite the polar opposite. I just didn't feel a connection to any of the characters and wasn't as engaged with the story as I have been with others in the past.
I did love the parts about the voice choir which was also the best part about the audio as it actually played a recording of the hymn and Bolero which gave me goosebumps. And of course, I shed many a tear at the end.
I definitely learned a lot and for that I am grateful to Heather Morris for bringing another true story to life. It just wasn't written in a way that I could fully engage with.
Thank you to NetGalley for sending me a digital copy in exchange for an honest review.
This real life story can be watched in the film Paradise Road.
I enjoyed the written words, and it's good to bring light to anyone who is not Antipodean and may not have known the atrocities that were committed in the Pacific.
I enjoyed the written words, and it's good to bring light to anyone who is not Antipodean and may not have known the atrocities that were committed in the Pacific.
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No