11 - The Postmistress

Finished The Postmistress by Sarah Blake. This is a review copy; the book comes out February 9. (Ask for it for Valentine's Day. Pre-order it from your bookstore of choice now, or at the very least put a hold on it at the library. If you have ever listened to me about a book, listen to me about this one.)

Here's the synopsis from Amazon (I cannot discuss it without rambling):

"It is 1940. France has fallen. Bombs are dropping on London. And President Roosevelt is promising he won't send our boys to fight in "foreign wars."

But American radio gal Frankie Bard, the first woman to report from the Blitz in London, wants nothing more than to bring the war home. Frankie's radio dispatches crackle across the Atlantic ocean, imploring listeners to pay attention--as the Nazis bomb London nightly, and Jewish refugees stream across Europe. Frankie is convinced that if she can just get the right story, it will wake Americans to action and they will join the fight.

Meanwhile, in Franklin, Massachusetts, a small town on Cape Cod, Iris James hears Frankie's broadcasts and knows that it is only a matter of time before the war arrives on Franklin's shores. In charge of the town's mail, Iris believes that her job is to deliver and keep people's secrets, passing along the news that letters carry. And one secret she keeps are her feelings for Harry Vale, the town mechanic, who inspects the ocean daily, searching in vain for German U-boats he is certain will come. Two single people in midlife, Iris and Harry long ago gave up hope of ever being in love, yet they find themselves unexpectedly drawn toward each other.

Listening to Frankie as well are Will and Emma Fitch, the town's doctor and his new wife, both trying to escape a fragile childhood and forge a brighter future. When Will follow's Frankie's siren call into the war, Emma's worst fears are realized. Promising to return in six months, Will goes to London to offer his help, and the lives of the three women entwine.

Alternating between an America still cocooned in its inability to grasp the danger at hand and a Europe being torn apart by war, The Postmistress gives us two women who find themselves unable to deliver the news, and a third woman desperately waiting for news yet afraid to hear it."

Me again.

You know how sometimes you read a book and, for reasons you can't explain, it just grabs you and you can't stop reading until you're done and it sort of ruins you for books that aren't it for a little while?

Yeah. That's this one.

Pretty much all I've done today is read this book and now I'm sad. It's not that the book's sad (although it's not really that happy, per se); it's that it's done. So here's hoping Sarah Blake writes something else soon.

Kathryn Stockett (who wrote The Help; my favorite book from last year) said, "Great books give you a feeling that you miss all day until you finally get to crawl back inside those pages. The Postmistress is one of those rare books. When I wasn't reading it, I was thinking about it.")