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A review by kathryn08
Wake by Anna Hope
3.0
I won this book in a Goodreads First Reads giveaway, so thanks to Transworld Publishers for their generosity. I'm really not sure what rating to give this book. I found it interesting reading and I'm tossing up between 3 stars (which would actually be 3.5) and 4 stars. I think I might need to let it sit for a while before I can decide.
There are 2 angles to this book. One angle is the selection and transport back to Britain of the remains of a soldier from WWI, which becomes the Unknown Soldier - a memorial for all the soldiers whose bodies lie in foreign soil. The other angle follows the lives of 3 women for 5 days in a Britain which is struggling in the aftermath of the war to pick up the pieces and continue on. It was interesting to gain a bit more insight into what the men who fought in France went through - those who returned and those who didn't, how those who returned tried to somehow find ways to cope in the post-war world, and the wives, girlfriends, mothers and sisters who were left behind - some never to see their loved ones again, some to have only broken shells of their husbands and sons returned to them - and how they found ways to cope with the changes.
The writing was well done, although I did find keeping the threads of the different characters a bit hard at first. It took me until page 150 to make a connection between a couple of the characters, although in retrospect, the clues were there before and I just missed them. I found the ending satisfying, with enough loose ends tied up to make me happy.
I think the title was clever - on one of the first pages, three definitions of the word "wake" are given and they are all applicable to this book - the waking of Britain to a new dawn post-war, the ceremony of the Unknown Soldier and the crowds lining the streets to observe the procession of the funeral cortege is the closest any of the men who died at the front had to any kind of ceremony like a wake, and it is in the wake of the first World War that Britain needs to carry on (the powers-that-be are hopeful that the ceremony and memorial of the Unknown Soldier will help in allowing the country to move on).
EDIT: I've decided on 3.5 stars (rounded down, since GR doesn't allow half-stars) because it hasn't really stuck with me (possibly more of a reflection on me than the book). It's still a good read, but if I'd been a bit haunted by one (or more) of the characters in the time since finishing it, I might have felt able to give it 4 stars.
There are 2 angles to this book. One angle is the selection and transport back to Britain of the remains of a soldier from WWI, which becomes the Unknown Soldier - a memorial for all the soldiers whose bodies lie in foreign soil. The other angle follows the lives of 3 women for 5 days in a Britain which is struggling in the aftermath of the war to pick up the pieces and continue on. It was interesting to gain a bit more insight into what the men who fought in France went through - those who returned and those who didn't, how those who returned tried to somehow find ways to cope in the post-war world, and the wives, girlfriends, mothers and sisters who were left behind - some never to see their loved ones again, some to have only broken shells of their husbands and sons returned to them - and how they found ways to cope with the changes.
The writing was well done, although I did find keeping the threads of the different characters a bit hard at first. It took me until page 150 to make a connection between a couple of the characters, although in retrospect, the clues were there before and I just missed them. I found the ending satisfying, with enough loose ends tied up to make me happy.
I think the title was clever - on one of the first pages, three definitions of the word "wake" are given and they are all applicable to this book - the waking of Britain to a new dawn post-war, the ceremony of the Unknown Soldier and the crowds lining the streets to observe the procession of the funeral cortege is the closest any of the men who died at the front had to any kind of ceremony like a wake, and it is in the wake of the first World War that Britain needs to carry on (the powers-that-be are hopeful that the ceremony and memorial of the Unknown Soldier will help in allowing the country to move on).
EDIT: I've decided on 3.5 stars (rounded down, since GR doesn't allow half-stars) because it hasn't really stuck with me (possibly more of a reflection on me than the book). It's still a good read, but if I'd been a bit haunted by one (or more) of the characters in the time since finishing it, I might have felt able to give it 4 stars.