Ellesea Loves Reading: New Publication Spotlight & Review: Love In A Time Of War by Adrienne Chinn

Sunday, 6 March 2022

New Publication Spotlight & Review: Love In A Time Of War by Adrienne Chinn

Love in a Time of War by Adrienne Chinn

Three sisters

The Great War

The end of innocence…

In 1913, in a quiet corner of London, the three Fry sisters are coming of age, dreaming of all the possibilities the bright future offers. But when war erupts their innocence is shattered and a new era of uncertainty begins.

Cecelia loves Max but his soldier’s uniform is German, not British, and suddenly the one man she loves is the one man she can’t have.

Jessie enlists in the army as a nurse and finally finds the adventure she’s craved when she’s sent to Gallipoli and Egypt, but it comes with an unimaginable cost.

Etta elopes to Capri with her Italian love, Carlo, but though her growing bump is real, her marriage certificate is a lie.

As the three sisters embark on journeys they never could have imagined, their mother Christina worries about the harsh new realities they face, and what their exposure to the wider world means for the secrets she’s been keeping…

A duel-time line novel visiting far-off lands...

On the cusp of WWI, nineteen-year-old Celia Fry and her younger twin sisters, Etta and Jessie, are young women who have very clear ideas on how they want to live their lives. Living in comfortable means with their parents, Christina and Gerald in Clover Bar, London, none are prepared for the harsh realities of the impending Great War and the locations it will lead them to.

The title and the blurb drew me to this enchanting novel, but it took some time and patience for me to fully digest the initial introduction to all the characters. Once, achieved, I fully embraced the narrative, as we not only follow the Fry sisters but also the intriguing flashbacks from their mother's point of view.

This is the second novel I've read by this author and again, I am blown away by the descriptive details of the various backdrops as these determined young women face up to the realities of adulthood. I appreciated how Ms. Chinn wrote the sisters so that their differing personalities shone through as they embrace the suffrage movement in their own individual way. It contrasts to how their mother is trying to prevent her daughters from making the mistakes she did herself as we learn about her life before she married Gerald.

As you would expect from such a novel, it ends on a cliffhanger… and a promise, leaving the reader craving for what could happen next? Therefore, this first instalment of this evocative trilogy sets the scene of what promises to be a truly memorable saga.

***arc generously received courtesy of One More Chapter via NetGalley***

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Love-Time-War-sweeping-historical-ebook/dp/B09B6HXHR5

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Love-Time-War-sweeping-historical/dp/0008501602

https://www.amazon.com/Love-Time-War-sweeping-historical-ebook/dp/B09B6HXHR5

https://www.amazon.ca/Love-Time-War-sweeping-historical-ebook/dp/B09B6HXHR5

https://www.amazon.ca/Love-Time-War-Adrienne-Chinn/dp/0008517835/

https://www.whsmith.co.uk/products/love-in-a-time-of-war-the-three-fry-sisters-book-1/adrienne-chinn/paperback/9780008501600.html

https://www.amazon.com.au/Love-Time-War-sweeping-historical-ebook/dp/B09B6HXHR5

https://www.amazon.com.au/Love-Time-War-sweeping-historical/dp/0008501602

https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=Yw86EAAAQBAJ

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/love-in-a-time-of-war-adrienne-chinn/1139904619

https://www.chapters.indigo.ca/en-ca/books/love-in-a-time-of/9780008517830-item.html

Adrienne Chinn was born in Grand Falls, Newfoundland, grew up in Quebec, and eventually made her way to London, England after a career as a journalist. In England she worked as a TV and film researcher before embarking on a career as an interior designer, lecturer, and writer. When not up a ladder or at the computer writing, she often can be found rummaging through flea markets or haggling in the Marrakech souk. Her second novel, The English Wife -- a timeslip story set in World War II England and contemporary Newfoundland -- was published in June 2020 and has become an international bestseller. Her debut novel, The Lost Letter from Morocco, was published by Avon Books UK in 2019. Her latest novel, Love in a Time of War, set during WWI, is the first in a series of three books based around the changing lives of three English sisters and their half-Italian mother, with a timeslip to 1890s Capri and London.