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Title: Wake
Author: Anna Hope
Narrator: Anna Hope
Format: Unabridged
Length: 10 hrs and 34 mins
Language: English
Release date: 01-16-14
Publisher: Random House Audiobooks
Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 1 votes
Genres: Fiction, Historical
Publisher's Summary:
Five Days in November, 1920: As the body of the Unknown Soldier makes its way home from the fields of Northern France, three women are dealing with loss in their own way: Hettie, who dances for sixpence a waltz at the Hammersmith Palais; Evelyn, who toils at a job in the pensions office, and Ada, a housewife who is beset by visions of her dead son.
One day a young man comes to her door. He carries with him a wartime mystery that will bind these women together and will both mend and tear their hearts. A portrait of three intertwining lives caught at the faultline between empire and modernity, Wake captures the beginnings of a new era, and the day the mood of the nation changed for ever.
Members Reviews:
Beautiful and compelling story
I have read some of the other reviews which I feel are less than generous regarding the fact that Anna Hope is reading her own story and therefore the reading is somewhat monotone. I think that given the subject of the story it would be hard for anyone to be joyful.
The story is set in the aftermath of the 1st World War when a whole generation of young men have been decimated and the women of the country are trying to come to terms with the loss of their sons, husbands, fiancés and indeed their futures.
Surviving men are also changed. Physically in many cases, but emotionally and psychologically almost certainly, and they too have to rewrite their own futures limited by the horrors of war.
The story concentrates on five days in November 1920 when the body of the unknown soldier is returning from France to be placed in the tomb at the Cenotaph. The body is to become a symbol of all the sons, husbands and fiancés which have been lost, either who cannot be identified at all, or whose bodies remain in France and cannot be reached by their own families.
It tells the story of three of the women who are linked by tragedy but who don't know each other. The story is poignant and beautiful and brought to life for me the era of my grandmother, who was 18 at the end of the First World War, and who I thought about often throughout the telling of the story.
I think this is a novel which will stay with me for a long time. I loved it in a sad way, it was haunting, well written and I shall listen to it again at some time in the future when I think I will probably identify even more depths to the story.
A book to break your heart
Where does Wake rank among all the audiobooks youve listened to so far?
Near the top for a number of things
What was one of the most memorable moments of Wake?
Ada's inability to articulate her feelings to her husband after seeing the medium
What does Anna Hope bring to the story that you wouldnt experience if you had only read the book?
Perfect pace
Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?
Not sure I could cope with all that emotion in one go
Any additional comments?
A history lesson to make you feel so many unspoken emotions
you will become involved, learn and weep
Where does Wake rank among all the audiobooks youve listened to so far?
its a great book, very well read. the characters are so well drawn that you feel their loss. the descriptions are clear and you begin to understand what the world post WW1 must have been like.
What was one of the most memorable moments of Wake?
the end when they all go to London to see the procession of the Unknown Warrior.
