April 11: A Lovely Day!

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

WOW. Code Name Verity is not my usual book: it's got torture, for crying out loud! It has pain and sadness and moral conflict and you just don't know how it's going to turn out!

But it is a dazzling read. The two readers of the Bolinda Audio version are amazing, and the story itself is well written, exciting, and historically and morally illuminating. I've always wondered about how I'd deal with torture (my hunch is that I'd spill my guts in the first moment) and what it would've been like to live during WWII--this books deals with both those questions, intently, honestly, and thoughtfully. The characters are great; the two halves of the book work well together, and the conclusion (there are actually several conclusions) is satisfying. Though Wein's afterword makes it clear that this is not really a historical novel, it illuminates a time period and a situation (life in Occupied France) extraordinarily well.

Again, I am amazed at how much I enjoyed this book. That said, I am not going to listen to Wein's new novel about life in Ravensbruck Concentration Camp. I may read it so I can skim!

View all my reviews Well, the weather change heralded by our two hour delay on April 1 continues: we had heavy rain on Tuesday, followed by some warmish sunny days and a noticeable diminution of our snow pack. Yay! Road-side ditches run with water; crocuses are up at the school; buds are swelling. AND: in less than a week, we'll be in Italy! I am very excited!