Thursday, May 23, 2013

I’ll Be Seeing You by Loretta Nyhan and Suzanne Hayes

Reviewed by Charlotte Lynn

In 1943 the woman were being left home while the men went to war.  Rita Vincenzo and Glory Whitehall are two such women, left behind not knowing where their men were, what they were doing, or if they would make it back to them in one piece.  These ladies exchanged letters sharing their fears, triumphs, and live with each other.  The friendship between Rita and Glory was not like most friendships since these ladies never met each other.  Their friendship was actually made by the picking addresses and names, pretend names, out of a hat.

When I received this book I was worried that the whole novel was written in letters.  This is one of my least favorite writing styles, but let me say I LOVED this novel.  I cried, I laughed, and worried right along with Rita and Glory.  World War II is my favorite time period to read from but I have never read a novel from the perspective of a wife/mother being left home and having their struggles told.  That point of view brought out a whole other side of the war and the effects it had on everyone.  The recipes shared showed how rationed the food was and how the women had to figure out how to stretch their food to make it enough to feed their families.  Just another part of the war that I had not given much thought to.

I truly enjoyed that the women were actually at different places in their lives.  Rita was settled in life with a grown son and husband away at war.  Glory was a newer bride with a young son and is pregnant.  There was many times that it felt like a mother/daughter relationship, with the advice share, but at other times it a best friend relationship.  The fact that they could share everything and then take the advice given without being upset with each other showed how true their friendship was.  It mad me value those honest and true friendships that I have.

The cover of I’ll Be Seeing You is absolutely gorgeous.  After finishing the story I closed the novel and just look at it imagining what that woman was feeling, holding her best friend in her hands.

I have to believe these two ladies met and grew old together staying best friends.  This novel is a heartwarming, lovely read that I will high recommend to everyone.

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The books we review on this site (A NOVEL REVIEW) are sent to us by publishers, authors or downloaded from Netgalley. This is a very common practice.  We never take payments for these reviews and all the reviews on this site are our own thoughts and feelings and are not influenced.




3 comments:

  1. Sounds wonderful! I'm adding it to my TBR pile!

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  2. I have an ARC of this one... I need to push it towards the top of the mountainous TBR pile! I actually love epistolary novels...I just finished reading Letters From Skye which is probably one of my favorite reads this year. I also loved The Guernsay Literary and Potato Peal Pie Society. Thanks for the great review!

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  3. This sounds like my kind of book. And I totally agree with you ... the cover is gorgeous!

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