My second RIP read of the year was the new release The Uninvited by Cat Winters. I got a review copy before it came out in August but I just couldn't resist saving it until time for the challenge.
Set during WWI and the influenza epidemic of 1918, Winters takes us to Buchanan, Illinois, former welcoming home of European immigrants but now a place of illness and suspicion. Ivy Rowan, a twenty-five year old "spinster" has just recovered from the flu and word has recently arrived that her brother Billy was killed in the war. The reaction of her father and other brother? Murder. This prompts Ivy to leave the home that she had been stuck in for years but what she finds in town might just be as horrible.
There are so many surprises and twists in this story that I don't want to say much more. I was annoyed by Ivy for a good chunk of the book but then, as I got to know her, I forgave more of her foibles. What was more interesting to me though (but also horrifying, especially when reading it in the context of current events) was the treatment of the German, Polish, and even Swedish citizens of this small town. Street and business names were changed, music and language were treated suspiciously, and, eventually, almost everyone who was different was either killed, arrested, or driven out of town. This was brutal to read about and almost as terrifying as the spooks. This was a fantastic historical fiction and a fairly good ghost story.
Trying to learn from the past,
K
Although this sounds interesting I'll give it a pass for now. Debate about Syrian refugees is at it's peak and I'm so appalled at what people share on FB, for instance, have had so many strange and dissapointing conversations with friends about it... So for now I'll keep my fiction away from anything refugee-related, to give my brain a bit of rest!
ReplyDeleteSeriously. This read was obviously a tough one anyway because of the hatred. But knowing that we haven't advanced as a society in 100 years and are still harboring the "us and them" mentality was depressing.
DeleteYou've left me torn! It really does sound like a great book, but I'm not sure I can stomach much more hatred like that, even if it is in a fictional work.
ReplyDeleteI guess that I haven't read much fiction set in America during the world wars because I hadn't read much yet that showed this particular aspect of them. It was definitely hard to read the racial epithets and such.
DeleteI just finished this, and for the first half of the book, I wasn't impressed. But I never saw the twist coming and from there on out I enjoyed it a lot more!
ReplyDeleteI agree completely.
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