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A review by lotsandoften
A Long Long Way by Sebastian Barry
5.0
I read this book with tears rolling down my face. Barry’s tight focus on this monstrous war allows you to really feel the pointless horror of it. To see the humanity burn so brightly amidst all that blood.
Willie Dunn is a wonderful protagonist, hopeful and doomed all at once. The journey he makes through the Belgian trenches equalled by the journey is his heart, as he realises the country he loves and is fighting for is “dissolving behind him like sugar cubes in the rain”. It’s a masterful, personal perspective with which to show the human effects of politics and 20th century history.
A truly remarkable novel. So painful. So beautiful.
Willie Dunn is a wonderful protagonist, hopeful and doomed all at once. The journey he makes through the Belgian trenches equalled by the journey is his heart, as he realises the country he loves and is fighting for is “dissolving behind him like sugar cubes in the rain”. It’s a masterful, personal perspective with which to show the human effects of politics and 20th century history.
A truly remarkable novel. So painful. So beautiful.