MY THOUGHTS:
I found this book's sequel first, at a free bookstand, then before reading that, discovered an Internet Archive copy of this one. It always amazes me that excellent books can slide beneath the radars of avid bookworms like myself. I'm sure I would have loved these when they were first published in the early nineties, when I was closer in age to the characters. But I simply didn't know about them then! And now, some thirty odd years later, they're out of print. That is so often the way with books. They are more transient than we think.
Anyway, I enjoyed this just as thoroughly now.
Jack and Alice Smallwood are working-class twins employed by the Morland family, who are landed gentry, at a property named Greenstocks. Alice is a housemaid and Jack is a groundskeeper and groom's assistant. He finds having to kowtow to Philip Morland, the haughty son and heir, a bitter pill to swallow. Philip is a tale-telling, stuck-up jerk who targets Jack for the worst jobs around the place.
Romantically, each twin deals with friction. Alice is in love with Edward Sidgwick, the local doctor's son, whose mother considers her beneath them socially, although Lorna, Edward's suffragette sister, becomes her good friend. And Jack has a serious crush on Harriet the flighty second housemaid at Greenstocks, who strings him along as she does many other young fellows, keeping her options open.
It is 1914 and world news is full of a senator's assassination in Sarajevo. Then rapid chaos breaks out globally and Britain is at war with Germany. The branching of the twins' separate stories suddenly widens as Jack enlists with his friends and heads off to fight on the battlefields of France, and Alice volunteers as a VAD (voluntary aid detachment) nurse which takes her first to London and eventually across the channel.
The story is fast-moving, emotionally satisfying, and immersive. Alice's nursing exploits are graphic and revealing, but Jack's experiences on the Western Front, dealing with his lifestyle in the trenches, kept me on the edge of my seat. Even before he sets eyes on the German soldiers, he knows they are mere yards away. Exceptional world events require intense heroism and courage from normal people. And Linda Newbery's sensual writing does it justice.
Although the whole word turns topsy-turvy, some things never change. Philip Morland gets promoted to an officer's position outright, due to nepotism, since his uncle is a colonel. So poor Jack realizes the artificial inequality on the battlefield mirrors that of the small village they come from.
Still, life involving trench raids and desperate dashes across No Man's Land is new to everyone, a perfect melting pot for unpredictability. The circumstance in which Jack earns himself a DCM (Distinguished Conduct Medal) is wonderful.
Being a World War One novel, we readers know that not every single character we grow fond of will emerge from the pages unscathed (or even alive). So keep a tissue box handy. I think Linda Newbery puts the words of her own mission into Lorna Sidgwick's mouth. 'We must never forget, and future generations must never forget, this appalling, tragic waste of life. There must never be another war.' Great writing that keeps the past alive is vital for this purpose, even for a shorter time than it should, when novels like this one sadly go out of print.
It wouldn't surprise me if this book makes it onto my list of the ten best reads this year. Now I'll get stuck into its sequel, The Kind Ghosts.
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