My Dear, I Wanted to Tell You

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and how they both fell for each other and want to do their best but then the soilder is always haunted by his past experiences in d battle .

However, this was an eye-opener to me, about the war itself, societal changes during the war, ethics and mores, and an introduction to Major Harold Gillies, who made outstanding progress in maxillo-facial and plastic surgery during World War I, and later, mostly at Queen's Hospital in Sidcup, England. Great advances in this field have always been made as a consequence of the horrific injuries inflicted on combatants in wars. Riley's own awareness of trying to lift himself towards better things, and his family's reaction to this are all quite evocatively told.Ultimately, this book got me through two plane rides and I was totally absorbed in it from beginning to end.

While this book was a gruesomely realistic tale of the brutality of war and the effects on those in the front lines and at home, it lacked this soul-splitting romance that I was expecting. Her battle with the enemy lines on her forehead distracts her almost entirely from her husband's slow breakdown. This leads you through the reasons the character chooses a certain path causing empathy with each person although there are wince inducing moments. As the years pass, Riley and Nadine become particularly close and by the time they are in their late teens, and the First World War has begun, they have fallen in love with one another. Daarvoor, toen de wereld nog zo anders was, is Nadine Waveney in een uitspatting van verliefdheid met haar jeugdliefde Riley Purefoy getrouwd.I found the narrative style a bit hard to follow; several times I had to go back and reread to try and figure out what had happened. Le style souvent saccadé pour reproduire, je suppose, le bruit des armes sur les champs de bataille n'est pas ce que j'apprécie le plus dans un roman -- mes voix iraient plutôt vers un style plus lyrique, plus poétique si on peut parler de poésie à propos de la guerre. I didn’t anticipate this war story to be so heavy on the romance, and at times I wasn’t too sure of Riley and Nadine’s love, feeling it was never fully developed before he heads off to war.

The storyline hopped between London and France during WWI, a period in history that I have never taken much time to learn about. Captain Purefoy and Major Peter Locke are both interesting, flawed characters, and the different paths they take to cope with the trenches are fascinating. Summary: A World War One love story but also a hugely moving story about the physical and mental scars of the war, both on those who fought and particularly on those left behind. Wasn't too sure if the pill was a little bit over-sweetened towards the end of the book - but, what the hell?A good although not brilliant book – I preferred Atonement which had much more depth (for example this book is very much written in the third-person multi-narrator but with lots of insights into characters thoughts – the very idea Atonement challenges).