A review by margaret21
The Evening Chorus by Helen Humphreys

5.0

I picked this book from the library shelf on a whim. What a gem. Inspired by, though not based on three true events, this lyrically told story sees the war and its aftermath from the perspective of three people, each intimately bound in each other's lives, but ultimately dealing with what confronts them in their own way, alone. It begins with James in his German POW camp, finding solace in his intimate record of the lives of the redwing family he can just about see from the camp confines. There is Rose, his wife in their cottage in an English village; Enid, his sister, living and working in London. And then there is Toby, working in James' and Rose's village; Constance, Rose's difficult mother ... and the POW camp's Kommandant. All have their roles in this story in which the actual horrors of war have no place, but which illustrates vividly its power to alter lives, to constrain, and yet to offer hope too.