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A review by kathryn08
The Beast's Garden by Kate Forsyth
4.0
This was one of those books which made me rather frustrated that real life sometimes has to take precedence over my reading life! It was a slow start, but once I got involved (less than a quarter of the way through), I didn’t want to put the book down.
My only complaint about this book was regarding a disconnect between the blurb on the back of my copy of the book and the story. There is one sentence about halfway through in the blurb which reveals a bit too much information and makes some of the main character, Ava’s, fears groundless, and it felt a bit strange that she was worrying about something that I knew wasn’t an issue! So read the blurb with caution - the GR blurb is slightly more circumspect, in this regard.
But Kate Forsyth’s research (in the afterword, she says that it took her 2 years of research for this book) shows through - I feel like I’ve read quite a few books about WWII, although not that much about the German Resistance, I guess. So there were things I didn’t know - the extent of some of the atrocities committed, the fact that the clothes of Jews who had been transported (and possibly exterminated?) were sent back to the Jewish Associations in Berlin, the fact that Jewish people were required to surrender their electric heaters and then their blankets and coats (under the pretext that the the German army required the blankets and coats - goodness knows what they were planning to do with the heaters!), and the acts of resistance undertaken by various anti-Nazi groups. Kate Forsyth's portrayal of what life was like for German citizens throughout the war felt incredibly realistic.
Now that I'm finished this book, I'm rather sorry that it's over!! Always a sign of a good book.
My only complaint about this book was regarding a disconnect between the blurb on the back of my copy of the book and the story. There is one sentence about halfway through in the blurb which reveals a bit too much information and makes some of the main character, Ava’s, fears groundless, and it felt a bit strange that she was worrying about something that I knew wasn’t an issue! So read the blurb with caution - the GR blurb is slightly more circumspect, in this regard.
But Kate Forsyth’s research (in the afterword, she says that it took her 2 years of research for this book) shows through - I feel like I’ve read quite a few books about WWII, although not that much about the German Resistance, I guess. So there were things I didn’t know - the extent of some of the atrocities committed, the fact that the clothes of Jews who had been transported (and possibly exterminated?) were sent back to the Jewish Associations in Berlin, the fact that Jewish people were required to surrender their electric heaters and then their blankets and coats (under the pretext that the the German army required the blankets and coats - goodness knows what they were planning to do with the heaters!), and the acts of resistance undertaken by various anti-Nazi groups. Kate Forsyth's portrayal of what life was like for German citizens throughout the war felt incredibly realistic.
Now that I'm finished this book, I'm rather sorry that it's over!! Always a sign of a good book.