Hope is on the horizon, but her greatest battle is about to begin. . .
From the author of the Sunday Times bestseller Dear Mrs Bird, Dear Miss Lake returns us to wartime London, where Emmy Lake is facing her greatest challenge yet.
London, July 1944. Journalist Emmy Lake’s career is soaring: Woman’s Friend magazine is a huge success, and she is finally realizing her dream of becoming a Lady War Correspondent. On the personal front, Emmy’s husband Charles has been posted closer to home, and they and their friends Bunty and Harold have escaped to the countryside for a few precious summer days. They all know how lucky they are.
But after nearly five years of war, the nation is struggling. The “Yours Cheerfully” advice column receives more letters than ever, and even though it looks like the war might finally be over by Christmas, the situation is far from resolved. For Emmy and her team, it’s all about pulling together and pushing on. But then disaster strikes. Soon Emmy needs her friends more than ever . . .
A fitting conclusion to the Emmy Lake series! I’ve really enjoyed this entire series and I was really happy to receive this ARC from NetGalley. It’s a very cosy WWII series but it’s definitely doesn’t shy away from the death and pain that came from living during the war. This book’s focus is on POWs and how it would be for the women left behind to wonder and wait to receive news.
I’m a rare one who preferred it when things were a little more on the bleak side so this book started off a little slow for me with the wedding, but after about 20% the plot of the book got moving and Charles gets taken prisoner, leaving Emmy waiting for news and connecting with other women who are waiting for news for their POW husbands/sons/relatives. Of course we get some focus on viewpoints going on at home, such as around pregnancy outside of marriage, and how Women’s Friend has to strike the balance between being actually useful and not being caught up by the censors. This causes issues later in the book and it’s a plotline I don’t think was wrapped up in a completely satisfactory fashion.
I enjoyed seeing many returning characters and especially the friendship between Emmy and Guy, as they’re now family and working towards the same goal, but have very different ideas of how to handle turmoil. I especially liked the part where Emmy went abroad to Belgium and would have loved to have seen more of that – of women’s lives on the front line as well as back home.
This was a delightful series all in all, and would recommend it for someone who wants some cosier WWII fiction, focusing especially on women’s lives at home.
