Not as captivating as "All Quiet On The Western Front", but still a good read.

To Newcastle

Thank you!!! :)

ETA: Reserved for gypsysmom

Thank you flambard for passing this book to me. I guess I may not have come across it otherwise. It completed the story of those lost in war and the post-war years. I am now passing on to another bookcrosser who recently read All Quiet on the Western Front.

posting to gypsysmom☺

Enjoy!!

This book was in our mail box tonight but the mystery is that we don't get mail delivered to our home anymore (the mail is delivered to community mail boxes and we have to go pick it up from there) so I am not quite sure how it ended up in the house mail box. I guess I shouldn't complain because I was not in favour of doing away with house delivery. Plus three weeks to get from England to here seems like quite quick service. Thanks Diane-Fraser for thinking of me when you saw I had read All Quiet on the Western Front.

I read All Quiet on the Western Front by this author last year and I thought it was possibly one of the best books about World War I that I had ever read. This book continues the story of the young German men that survived the war. In its own way it is as moving as All Quiet.

The young German boys who enlisted at the behest of their teacher are no longer the callow youths who went to war. They have seen too much, killed too much, experienced too much to ever happily return to ordinary civilian life. They don't know how to be with people who were not soldiers and they can't continue to stay with their mates. Each one of them suffers from what we would now call PTSD. Quite a few have physical disablities. The young men who went to war don't know what to do. Additionally, Germany is faced with rampant inflation and most people can't find work. Some may not survive peace.

When I posted my review on LibraryThing a friend commented that she was making a note to read this. Since this book was sent to me from England I offered to send it to her on the west coast of Canada and she gladly accepted because her library did not have a copy. So it has gone into the hands of Canada Post and should be delivered next week.

When you find a BookCrossing book it is yours to do with what you like. You can read it and keep it or pass it on or if you don't think it is your kind of book pass it on to someone who might like it or release it in a spot for someone else to find like you just did. Whatever you choose it would be great if you could write a short note letting us know what new adventures the book is on.