“The men crouch low, and with their gloved hands, as best they can, they clear the mud from the body.  But it is not a body, not really; it is only a heap of bones inside the remains of a uniform.  Nothing is left of the flesh, only a few black-brown remnants clinging to the side of the skull.”

Book Review:

Review by Roger Brunyate  (FEB 2, 2014)

One of the aspects of this impressive debut by Anna Hope that makes me raise my hat is the effectiveness with which she handles its secondary thread. In italics interspersing the main story a page or two at a time, are little vignettes as British officials exhume the body of an unidentified soldier from the battlefields of Northern France, prepare it for a new coffin, and take it with due solemnity to its final resting place in the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Westminster Abbey. The vignettes, and the story that they enfold, span a five-day period leading up to November 11, 1920, the second anniversary of the Armistice. The First World War is over, but what has become of the survivors?

Each of the vignettes contains an anonymous figure — from a soldier assisting with the disinterment to a war widow bringing her child to watch the procession — real and dimensioned enough for the reader to feel for them, even as the camera moves on. They are emblems of countless stories that might be developed in their millions all over the country, although Hope has chosen to focus on only three. Three women, all coping with loss, all seeking a way to move forward. There is Hettie, a dance hostess at the Hammersmith Palais, whose brother has returned sound in body but damaged in his mind; she is looking for her life to begin, but the normal patterns have all been disrupted. There is Ada, a mother in her forties, the loss of whose son Michael has caused an estrangement between her and her husband. Unlike other parents, they have no information about their son’s resting place; is it possible the Unknown Soldier might be Michael himself? And there is Evelyn, an upper-class girl who has tried to bury herself in a munitions factory and then in a government office after the death of her boyfriend; for five years now, she has not permitted herself to love, and hardly even to live.

Hope juggles the three stories freely in short episodes spread over the five days. She also sketches some connections between them. Evelyn’s brother, for instance, a captain in the army who has come back with his own problems, turns out to have connections with both Hettie and Ada’s son Michael. There were times, I admit, when I was conscious of almost a romance-novel artifice in the writing. But no sooner would I register this than something would come along that was truly fine. To give but one example, there is a scene when Ada goes to consult a medium to find out about Michael. Historically, it is apt; the First World War brought a huge revival of interest in spiritualism. But Ada’s meeting with the medium turns out to be something else entirely, totally human and deeply moving.

This is a novel that is perfectly titled. Wake, as in the wake of a ship, or turbulent aftermath of some great passing. Wake, as in the ritual for the dead. And Wake, as in to awaken from sleep and dreams. All perfectly realized in this deceptively unpretentious novel. As always, I thought of a number of other books while I was reading. I almost immediately put aside the obvious comparison to Jacqueline Winspear’s Maisie Dobbs series; Anna Hope has more penetrating ambitions. I certainly thought a lot about Sarah Waters’  The Night Watch, another rich exploration of the lives of women, this time in the shadow of the Second World War. But the comparison that increasingly stuck with me was of a different order entirely: to Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway. And that is a high compliment.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 18 readers
PUBLISHER:	Random House (February 11, 2014)
REVIEWER:	Roger Brunyate
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Wikipedia page on Anna Hope
EXTRAS:	Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: The Soldier’s Wife by Margaret Leroy

Bibliography:

• Wake (February 2013)

“If I could have ceased what pendulums swung, or wheels turned, or water clocks emptied, then, in order to keep the Fates from marching in time, I would have, for though it is what a boy naturally wishes when he fears change will come upon what he loves and take it away, a man remembers it, too, and in his heart wishes the same when all around him he feels only loss, loss that has been his companion for some time, and promises to remain at his side.”

Book Review:

Review by Betsey Van Horn  (MAY 25, 2011)

World War I was the deadliest conflict in Western history, but contemporary portrayals of war in literature and cinema primarily focus on examples of combat from the past fifty or sixty years. At a time when the Great War is receding into the annals of distant history, this elegiac and edifying novel has been released–a small, slim but powerful story of a young soldier, Josef Vinich, who hails from a disenfranchised and impoverished family in rural Austria-Hungary.

Josef was born in the rural mining town of Pueblo, Colorado, in 1899, to immigrant parents from Austria-Hungary who dreamed of a better life in the United States. The opening eleven-page prologue, a stunning and deeply felt family tragedy, is subsequently followed by a move back to the Empire, to his father’s village of Pastvina (which is now part of the Czech Republic). Josef’s father then marries a cruel woman with two young sons. They live the hardscrabble existence of shepherds, barely able to put food on the table, in the cold and brutal climate of the region. Josef and his father live for part of the year in a cabin in the Carpathian Mountains and ply their trade of husbandry in order to survive.

At the age of ten, Josef is introduced to his father’s Krag rifle, and is instructed in the art of hiding and hunting their prey. A distant cousin, Marian Pes–nicknamed Zlee–who was one year older than Josef, is sent to live with them. Zlee has an instinct for shepherding, and together they form a brotherly bond of love and respect. Josef’s sleep is haunted by dreams of loss and he gradually becomes distant from his father.

In 1916, when Zlee turns eighteen, both boys go to the conscription office to join up. Josef alters the age on his identity card so that he can go, too. During artillery training, they are recognized for their skill of aiming and shooting, and are sent to train as snipers, or “sharpshooters,” which in German is called Scharfschützen. What follows is a coming of age story set in the harsh climate and geography in the trenches of war–to Austria to train as Scharfschützen, and eventually to the sub-zero temperature of the Italian Alps.

Krivak writes with the precision and beauty of a finely cut gem and with the meticulous pace and purpose of a classical conductor. Every word is necessary and neatly positioned. His prose is evocative, poetic, and distilled. There is a place between the breath of the living and the faces of the dead, and that is where Josef’s soul resides. When the author takes the reader to the abyss of loss and the ghosts of Time, it is riveting. However, the emotional resonance was primarily potent in the prologue and only periodically in the body of the story, and was otherwise low-timbred and somewhat distancing. The narrative is so deliberately controlled that at times it felt antiseptic and dispassionate.

Krivak’s first novel is highly recommended as an addition to a library of World War I literature. This is an admirable debut, and it is evident from the prologue that Krivak is capable of crafting an emotionally satisfying story.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 13 readers
PUBLISHER:	Bellevue Literary Press (April 19, 2011)
REVIEWER:	Betsey Van Horn
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Publisher page on Andrew Krivak
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: Work Song by Ivan Doig A Soldier of the Great War by Mark Helprin

Bibliography:

• The Sojourn (April 2011)

Nonfiction:

• A Long Retreat: In Search of a Religious Life (2008)