romonko 's review for:

Beyond That, the Sea by Laura Spence-Ash

3.5

emotional hopeful reflective relaxing slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: No

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This is a book that was given to me by my Secret Santa, and I finally got around to reading it. It is a very well written book and brings to the surface, anlot of things about life, death, family, friends, and how all of these things interact during times of great world stress like World War II, as is the case in this book. It is a long, sprawling, and sweeping book that sweeps across two continents and between two families. These two families are separated by the Atlantic Ocean, Beatrix Thompson, at the age of 11, is sent across to the United States in order to avoid the blitz that is occurring in London, where her parents are. She is housed with a family of four – a father mother and two boys. The book covers her time staying with them for five years while the war was raging in Europe. And then it goes back over to England when Beatrix leaves after the war is over. The book moves along at a slow pace until approximately 10 years after Beatrix has come back to England when one of the sons that she was living with stopped to visit her in England. This brings Beatrix’s mind back to her time that she spent with the Gregory family. There are a lot of emotions in this book and it is very well written, although I found that at times it dragged a bit and it took me an awfully long time to get through it as I was reading other books that became available from my holds at the library. I found that I could easily slip back into the story and into the characters every time I did leave it to read another book and I would slip right back p into the story again. The book took me through many varied human emotions and I was right back there With Beatrix, William and Gerald. Sometimes it’s nice to read a leisurely, pleasant book that moves along at its own pace, and that’s what I found out with this one.