I have only read two of this California author’s 20 novels-the historical fiction The Nightingale, which I quite enjoyed and this latest one. I read this one as an Ebook on CloudLibrary. This is also loosely historical, focused on the almost entirely forgotten lives of the women who served, mostly as nurses, in the Vietnam War.
The life of Frankie McGrath is forever changed by her experiences when she volunteers as a nurse to serve in the army. She is from a staid conservative, Catholic family in the navy town of Coronado Island off the coast of San Diego, and her beloved brother has been killed in Vietnam.
The horrors of war are described in extreme detail, as are the risks and trauma she experiences there, between 1966 and 1969, and there is no doubt it was horrendous. She falls for one of three lovers while there; the sex is described tastefully, but the deceptions she then discovers adds to her later severe PTSD.
She returns to Coronado Island to a hostile antiwar family and country, becomes confused about the morality of the war, lost, and depressed, surviving only with the help of fellow nurses who have also been in Vietnam and her reluctant parents. I will not spoil the plot further, which becomes quite complex with many surprises although it is not difficult to keep the characters straight.
The description of wounds, and their care seem realistic and graphic. There is a definite and justified feminist tone to the book, as the returning women were treated even worse than the returning men.
It would seem unkind to downgrade this book because of the extreme pathos of many episodes, having never experienced anything as dramatic as the horrors of war, but I could not help but think that there might be some exaggeration.
To be extremely picky, she confuses cement with concrete.
8/10
Thanks, Vera.
The Passionate Reader 