Jackie G

The plot is the strongest element in this book about a young woman raising her daughter in the rigid and disapproving household of her parents in Liverpool, England, prior to WWII. Although the title gives away the major focus of the novel, I was captivated by the idea that Vivian's Catholic parents demanded that she marry a Jewish man she hardly knew and then sent him away to never be part of Viv or the baby's lives. Ironically, it is the war that wrenches Vivian's daughter from her as she sends her child to the safety of the country as part of the Child Relocation program and yet this trauma also gives Viv the courage to wrest herself away from the cruel dominance of her parents and find work as a female "postie".
Joshua, Viv's absent and unseen husband, is in America when the war begins, and he enters the picture after the child Maggie is relocated and then lost. I found Joshua's family, the Levinson's, most compelling as they dealt with loss of their son and only grandchild along with the stigma of Judaism in the 1940's. Nevertheless, I found most of the characters flat and two-dimensional. For instance, Joshua dreams of being a sax player, but the author demonstrates only a cursory understanding of music. He is also a RAF navigator, but I know much more about WWII flying from other novels.
I enjoyed the novel; I was caught up in the stories of prejudice and hate and redeeming love in the backdrop of nightly bombings and families torn apart, and while the ending was somewhat predictable, it had a modern feminist touch to it as well. The novel is fast-paced, and I may have wished for more realistic details blended into the story, yet I would recommend it---especially for those who are put off by long descriptions.