herreadingroom's review against another edition
5.0
This is a great book!
Set in the early 1900's and encompassing the First World War, it is the story of Eva Downey and her love for Christopher Shandlin, her teacher, whom she meets while at finishing school.
Amid the destructive and corrosive family dynamics between Eva, her stepmother and her step sister, Eva is emotionally blackmailed into publicly giving Christopher a white feather when he refuses to enlist. The ramifications of this act of betrayal are set to be shocking and far reaching - and Eva has little idea how much this act will alter the course of their lives forever.
The story deftly covers the sensitive and highly charged issues of that era - conscientious objection, sexuality, infidelity, shell shock, votes for women and the marital role of women.
My only negative comment about this book would have to be about the ending which I thought disappointing. The book seemed to end somewhat abruptly and all of a sudden when I felt the plot had lots more to deliver. Having said that, this in no way detracted any enjoyment from this brilliant debut novel. At times hard hitting and brutally traumatic but always vibrant and riveting, its characters credible and three dimensional.
Great story, brilliant plot and an excellent read! Highly recommended.
Set in the early 1900's and encompassing the First World War, it is the story of Eva Downey and her love for Christopher Shandlin, her teacher, whom she meets while at finishing school.
Amid the destructive and corrosive family dynamics between Eva, her stepmother and her step sister, Eva is emotionally blackmailed into publicly giving Christopher a white feather when he refuses to enlist. The ramifications of this act of betrayal are set to be shocking and far reaching - and Eva has little idea how much this act will alter the course of their lives forever.
The story deftly covers the sensitive and highly charged issues of that era - conscientious objection, sexuality, infidelity, shell shock, votes for women and the marital role of women.
My only negative comment about this book would have to be about the ending which I thought disappointing. The book seemed to end somewhat abruptly and all of a sudden when I felt the plot had lots more to deliver. Having said that, this in no way detracted any enjoyment from this brilliant debut novel. At times hard hitting and brutally traumatic but always vibrant and riveting, its characters credible and three dimensional.
Great story, brilliant plot and an excellent read! Highly recommended.
steph1rothwell's review against another edition
4.0
White Feathers is another very good novel set during WW1. Telling the story of Eva and Christopher, whose love affair is destroyed by Eva's family and the devastation of a World War.
Events at the front were very graphic and for me the best parts of the novel. Even though I knew about it, I had never come across the giving of white feathers in a novel before and I didn't know that it was common among suffragettes. I also had never heard of the Brittanic and have since read that events that happened on it were true.
I didn't care much for either Eva or Christopher. I preferred Sybil, who came across as a lot warmer than any other characters in the novel.
I would be interested in reading more by Susan Lanigan and would recommend to anybody who likes to read about this time in history.
With thanks to RealReaders for sending me this novel to review.
Events at the front were very graphic and for me the best parts of the novel. Even though I knew about it, I had never come across the giving of white feathers in a novel before and I didn't know that it was common among suffragettes. I also had never heard of the Brittanic and have since read that events that happened on it were true.
I didn't care much for either Eva or Christopher. I preferred Sybil, who came across as a lot warmer than any other characters in the novel.
I would be interested in reading more by Susan Lanigan and would recommend to anybody who likes to read about this time in history.
With thanks to RealReaders for sending me this novel to review.
thelizmaguire's review against another edition
4.0
White Feathers is the debut novel from Irish author Susan Lanigan. Divided into five sections detailing the years with young Eva Downey and the role World War I in her life, White Feathers is a historical romance with guts . After receiving a generous endowment to attend a finishing school, Lanigan’s fictionalized “The Links”, Eva leaves her family home in London. Eva and her step-mother Catherine, her father’s second wife, share a tense relationship since the family’s immigration from Ireland nearly ten years before. While at school Eva explores and expands her understanding of life through the tutelage of her English teacher, Mr. Shandlin. When her elder sister Imelda takes ill, Eva leaves Links behind— until Sybil, her friend from the school, tells Mr. Shandlin where he might find the brilliant and beautiful Eva. When the war and family obligations interrupt their courtship Eva is forced to do the worst imaginable…and so begins White Feathers.
I was first approached by the author, Susan Lanigan, in January of this year (2015) to read and review the novel. I set about reading White Feathers as spring opened the skies in Dublin. In the window seat of my favorite cafe, perched above D’Olier Street with the novel open on my lap, rain lashed the glass beside me while I read and read and read. White Feathers was so intense and addictive that my tea went cold and unnoticed—perhaps the greatest sign of enthralling literature. I found White Feathers well written and well paced. The plot could have become stale in the length of the novel (my copy is close to 450 pages) but Lanigan’s division into five sections is wise. It allows her to jump timeline and bring plots forward without entire scenes of exposition. Dotted within the text are letters from one character to another which adds an element of the beyond to the story, allowing Lanigan to move the plot swiftly and have her characters do most of the talking.
I always admire an author who can stock their story in such history without it becoming a textbook and I think Lanigan succeeds. By laying the historical foundations thickly in the first two sections of the story, there is room to move within the universe created in the last three. Lanigan trusts her characters implicitly. The story is carried by the confident, human voices behind the typeset. I am often amazed by how the human brain can configure only so many letters, arranged into so many words, into images and sometimes even living breathing flesh in their minds. Lanigan is a natural story teller and that’s evident in this popular debut.
Without further adieu I recommend this book whole heartedly for anyone interested in World War I fiction, romance or coming of age stories set in Europe. You can find the novel in your local Waterstones, or online here. You can learn more about Susan Lanigan by visiting her website or join the conversation about White Feathers on Twitter!
I was first approached by the author, Susan Lanigan, in January of this year (2015) to read and review the novel. I set about reading White Feathers as spring opened the skies in Dublin. In the window seat of my favorite cafe, perched above D’Olier Street with the novel open on my lap, rain lashed the glass beside me while I read and read and read. White Feathers was so intense and addictive that my tea went cold and unnoticed—perhaps the greatest sign of enthralling literature. I found White Feathers well written and well paced. The plot could have become stale in the length of the novel (my copy is close to 450 pages) but Lanigan’s division into five sections is wise. It allows her to jump timeline and bring plots forward without entire scenes of exposition. Dotted within the text are letters from one character to another which adds an element of the beyond to the story, allowing Lanigan to move the plot swiftly and have her characters do most of the talking.
I always admire an author who can stock their story in such history without it becoming a textbook and I think Lanigan succeeds. By laying the historical foundations thickly in the first two sections of the story, there is room to move within the universe created in the last three. Lanigan trusts her characters implicitly. The story is carried by the confident, human voices behind the typeset. I am often amazed by how the human brain can configure only so many letters, arranged into so many words, into images and sometimes even living breathing flesh in their minds. Lanigan is a natural story teller and that’s evident in this popular debut.
Without further adieu I recommend this book whole heartedly for anyone interested in World War I fiction, romance or coming of age stories set in Europe. You can find the novel in your local Waterstones, or online here. You can learn more about Susan Lanigan by visiting her website or join the conversation about White Feathers on Twitter!
priyabhakta's review against another edition
4.0
I really enjoyed this book. So much happens and Eva is an extremely compelling protagonist. I was really rooting for her and Christopher throughout and was riveted by the complications in their way. So much happens and my only disappointment came from the fact more didn't happen. I look forward to reading more from Susan Lanigan in the future.
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