LoveReading Says
Carolyn Kirby’s When We Fall tells the gripping, read-in-one-sitting stories of two women who fall for the same man. Sparked by the long-suppressed WW2 Katyn massacre atrocity that saw 22,000 Polish military officers and intelligentsia killed by the Soviet Union, it presents the painful complexities of love and loyalty during terrible times in readably elegant style.
England, 1943 and British pilot Vee is set on being given her Wings when she first encounters charismatic Polish RAF pilot Stefan. There’s an immediate frisson between them, and from this first meeting their lives are to be entangled for the rest of their days. Both of them are immensely likeable - Vee for her dogged and down-to-earth determination to succeed in a male dominated field, and Stefan for his amiability and respectfulness.
Meanwhile, in the Polish town of Posen (formerly Poznań), Eva (formerly Ewa before Nazi occupation) has all but given up on her lover returning as she waits tables in her father’s guesthouse while working for the resistance. Matters are complicated when she falls for a handsome German officer, and then her lover - Stefan - returns and asks Eva to take a huge risk for him. He’s asked similar of Vee in England and so, unbeknown to each other, both women become caught up in a costly mission to disclose the horrors Stefan witnessed while in Russian captivity.
Covering events from spring 1943 to late 1945 (with an unexpected addendum from 1963), this is a highly visual, highly sensory novel with relatable, powerful human dilemmas at its heart.
Joanne Owen
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When We Fall Synopsis
A TIMES AND SUNDAY TIMES HISTORICAL NOVEL OF THE YEARFrom the acclaimed author of The Conviction of Cora Burns, longlisted for the Historical Writers' Association Debut Crown Award'A poignant story of love, betrayal and impossible moral choices' - Nick Rennison, Sunday TimesEngland, 1943. Lost in fog, pilot Vee Katchatourian is forced to make an emergency landing where she meets enigmatic RAF airman Stefan Bergel, and then can't get him out of her mind. In occupied Poland, Ewa Hartman hosts German officers in her father's guest house, while secretly gathering intelligence for the Polish resistance. Mourning her lover, Stefan, who was captured by the Soviets at the start of the war, Ewa is shocked to him on the street one day. Haunted by a terrible choice he made in captivity, Stefan asks Vee and Ewa to help him expose one of the darkest secrets of the war. But it is not clear where everyone's loyalties lie until they are tested... Published to coincide with the 75th anniversary of VE Day and based on WWII war atrocity the Katyn massacre, When We Fall is a moving story of three lives forever altered by one fatal choice.'A terrific World War II novel, which deals with complicated matters of love and loyalty when lives are at stake and choices are bleak... Tense and tender, it captures the terrifying frailties of truth and trust in brutal time' - Eithne Farry, Daily Mail'A gripping wartime thriller, driven by two memorable heroines' - Antonia Senior, The Times'Historical fiction at its finest' - Howard Linskey'An engaging and elegantly written novel on the grim realities of war, and the moral choices that can result. Highly recommended' - Roger Moorhouse'In a story where loyalties are called into question, she kept me guessing to the final page' - Anita Frank, author of The Lost Ones
About This Edition
| ISBN: |
9780857303967 |
| Publication date: |
10th April 2020 |
| Author: |
Kirby, Carolyn |
| Publisher: |
No Exit Press |
| Format: |
Ebook (Epub) |
| Primary Genre |
Historical Fiction
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| Other Genres: |
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| Recommendations: |
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