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3.83 AVERAGE
3.83 AVERAGE
Ratings (1 to 5)
Writing: 5
Plot: 5
Characters: 5
Emotional impact: 5
Overall rating: 5
I loved this book. My favorite in a long while!
Writing: 5
Plot: 5
Characters: 5
Emotional impact: 5
Overall rating: 5
I loved this book. My favorite in a long while!
Received an ARC of Wake and loved it! Author does a great job of telling three women and their stories of WWI. I didn't want to put it down because I wanted to know more of each important story! To say more may give away something.
This one didn't catch me as much as it did other people. The ending is good but I wasn't "in love" - the first half of the book was ok.
Beautiful and evocative, brings the confusion and turbulent emotions of post-WWI London - and the lingering presence of the war's devastation - to vivid life. The final stretch, leading to the burial of the Unknown Warrior on the first Armistice Day, is wonderfully paced, heart-wrenching, and - like the whole book - full of echoing insights.
Book Group Choice:
WW1 book dealing mainly with the aftermath of the war and of the people who had been left at home.
Ada - waiting for news of her son Michael even though she and hubby suspect he’s been killed;
Hettie - waiting for her life to start, she wants excitement. Then meets a chap in a nightclub who is enigmatic/alluring but all is not plain sailing;
Evelyn - is helping ex-service men and worrying about her brother.
The 3 stories entwine. Dealt sympathetically with all the emotions. Short but well written.
WW1 book dealing mainly with the aftermath of the war and of the people who had been left at home.
Ada - waiting for news of her son Michael even though she and hubby suspect he’s been killed;
Hettie - waiting for her life to start, she wants excitement. Then meets a chap in a nightclub who is enigmatic/alluring but all is not plain sailing;
Evelyn - is helping ex-service men and worrying about her brother.
The 3 stories entwine. Dealt sympathetically with all the emotions. Short but well written.
3.5: A quick read with some intriguing characters, but revisiting terrain Barker’s Regeneration covered with more depth and nuance. Still, a successful blend of historical research and fiction on postwar trauma.
I'm always on the lookout for some good WWI fiction and probably came across this on a goodreads list somewhere. I enjoy the home-front framework as much as front line action and this is from an all female perspective which I enjoyed.
I guess I should point out that this takes place after the war, but in the week leading up to the burial of the Unknown Soldier at Westminster Abbey two years after the war. But the war looms large for all three main characters, and the transition to the new decade was poignant and well done. How do you move on and embrace the future when you can't forget the hellish pain? There were parts of this book that were really insightful. The characterization was spot on, and the three main characters and side characters made for an easy and interesting read. And the setting - time and place - was excellent.
What I thought didn't work so well was the narrative about the soldier transfer. There are several sections in italics that provide details about the bodies of the possible unknown soldier. These sections were distracting and I guess I didn't think I needed to know the exact how part because I was already caught up in the emotional punch from the experiences of the characters. I also thought that the stories didn't need to be linked in the manner that they were. Three completely separate story lines would have been just as meaningful.
I guess I should point out that this takes place after the war, but in the week leading up to the burial of the Unknown Soldier at Westminster Abbey two years after the war. But the war looms large for all three main characters, and the transition to the new decade was poignant and well done. How do you move on and embrace the future when you can't forget the hellish pain? There were parts of this book that were really insightful. The characterization was spot on, and the three main characters and side characters made for an easy and interesting read. And the setting - time and place - was excellent.
What I thought didn't work so well was the narrative about the soldier transfer. There are several sections in italics that provide details about the bodies of the possible unknown soldier. These sections were distracting and I guess I didn't think I needed to know the exact how part because I was already caught up in the emotional punch from the experiences of the characters. I also thought that the stories didn't need to be linked in the manner that they were. Three completely separate story lines would have been just as meaningful.
It's a simple enough premise - the stories of three women struggling to cope on their loss and heartache post-WWII whilst maintaining their everyday lives and it's one that is done extremely well. There are no big twists or shocks, it's just a really artfully written book.
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
A surprising novel. The plot took turns that I wasn’t expecting, but were earned and warranted.
"War wins," he says. "And it keeps on winning, over and over again." (p. 255)
Wake is the debut novel from Anna Hope, and in my opinion it is a stunning debut that takes a hard look at the realities of life after the war. It was beautifully written and the approach that the author takes, using the lives of three women, to examine the war was original and provided another perspective to view a momentous moment in history.
The novel is formed around the days leading up to the Unknown Warrior's procession through London in November 1920. The mood is grim. The country is still coming to terms with the war. Veterans are struggling to make ends meet. Women are mourning the loss of theirs sons, brothers, husbands, and lovers. Others just want life to move forward; they want the country to move on. The author shows these varying circumstances through the eyes of three different women.
Ada has lost her son, Michael, in the war. She has been struggling to cope with his death, made even more difficult with no details about how he died or a body to mourn. Slowly, her marriage is crumbling under the strain of both parents' grief. Neither seem able to take comfort in the other.
Evelyn has lost her lover during the war. She continues to work despite her wealthy background, and interacts with soldiers on a daily basis at her job. Like Ada, Evelyn is struggling with her grief and has been moving through life numb. She envy's her brother, a veteran of the war, who seems to be able to move on with his life, but like her, his competence is an illusion.
Hettie is the last woman, and she's the youngest. Unlike Ada and Evelyn, Hettie simply doesn't understand why the world hasn't moved on. She wants to start living again. While her brother has come home broken, Hettie simply wants to ignore the after effects of the war.
Each of these woman's lives is connected despite the fact that they never actually meet. All of them experience an awakening of some sort, and in that, the reader is offered some semblance of hope in a truly bleak landscape. In a short few days Ada, Evelyn, and Hettie will all be changed, and in this, I think the novel is very aptly titled. Each woman "wakes" to a realization, and while each learns and accepts something different, I think it can stand in for the many grieving the losses from the war.
For me, what was powerful about this book was the author's choice to focus mainly on women after the war. Women didn't fight the war, but they certainly had to deal with it when the men came home.
"I see so many women here," she says, "and they are holding, all of them. Holding on to their sons or their lovers or their husbands, or their fathers, just as surely as they are holding on to the photographs they keep or the fragments of childhood they bring with them and put on the table here." She gestures with her hand. "They're all different but all the same. All of them are afraid to let them go. And if we feel guilt, we find it even harder to release the dead. We keep them close to us; we guard them jealously. They were ours. We want them to remain ours." There's a silence. "But they are not ours," she says. "And in a sense, they never were. They belong to themselves, only. Just as we belong to ourselves. And this is terrible in some ways, and in others...is might set us free." (p. 206)
Both Ada and Evelyn are holding on to their men, they do not see themselves as separate. It's as if life has stopped for them now that Michael and Fraser are gone. Even without wanting to, Hettie finds herself bound to the men changed by the war, her bother and the mysterious Ed that she meets. However, I think attending the procession of the Unknown Warrior allows them all to realize that they are separate entities from the men around them; they are responsible for their own lives and their own happiness. And I think this realization says a lot about the nature of grief and the ability to move on, and perhaps why some are not able to move on.
Ultimately, Wake was a stunning novel. It was harsh and beautiful at the same time. War was not romanticized here, but treated respectfully. This was a thought provoking read and I know that it is one that will stay with me.
Review with similar reads on my blog.