Author: Suzanne Feldman
Published by: MIRA on Oct. 26, 2021
Genres: Historical Fiction
Pages: 400
Format: ARC, Paperback
Source: Harlequin Trade Publishing
Book Rating: 8.5/10
Inspired by real women, this powerful novel tells the story of two unconventional American sisters who volunteer at the front during World War I
August 1914. While Europe enters a brutal conflict unlike any waged before, the Duncan household in Baltimore, Maryland, is the setting for a different struggle. Ruth and Elise Duncan long to escape the roles that society, and their controlling father, demand they play. Together, the sisters volunteer for the war effort–Ruth as a nurse, Elise as a driver.
Stationed at a makeshift hospital in Ypres, Belgium, Ruth soon confronts war’s harshest lesson: not everyone can be saved. Rising above the appalling conditions, she seizes an opportunity to realize her dream to practice medicine as a doctor. Elise, an accomplished mechanic, finds purpose and an unexpected kinship within the all-female Ambulance Corps. Through bombings, heartache and loss, Ruth and Elise cherish an independence rarely granted to women, unaware that their greatest challenges are still to come.
Illuminating the critical role women played in the Great War, this is a remarkable story of resilience, sacrifice and the bonds that can never be vanquished.
Review:
Immersive, evocative, and affecting!
Sisters of the Great War is an alluring tale set in German-Occupied Belgium and France during WWI that follows two American sisters, Ruth, a nurse who yearns to be a surgeon, and Elise, a mechanic with unprecedented skills with an engine, as they head to the front lines to help transport, heal, and save as many lives as possible in a landscape littered with blood, tears, ashes, ruins, and lost men.
The prose is vivid and smooth. The characters are dependable, courageous, and resilient. And the plot is a moving tale of life, loss, self-discovery, heartbreak, determination, hope, loyalty, tragedy, survival, friendship, love, and wartime medicine.
Overall, Sisters of the Great War is an emotive, rich, absorbing tale by Feldman that transports you to another time and place and immerses you so thoroughly into the feelings, lives, and personalities of the characters you can’t help but be enthralled and fully invested from start to finish.
This novel is available on October 26, 2021.
Pick up a copy from your favourite retailer or one of the following links.
Thank you to Suzanne Feldman for providing me with a copy in exchange for an honest review.
Great review, Zoe. It is nice to see more books set during WWI, as this is an event I don’t often read about. It is on my TBR, now.