I often find with historical novelists that they favour one particular period in history. Maybe that is because it is their favourite period or maybe it is because they don't want all that research to go to waste!?! But occasionally you find a writer who is bold enough to chase the centuries and dig through the decades. Carolyn Kirby is one of those writers. The Conviction of Cora Burns, which I had the pleasure of reading and reviewing about a year ago, was very much the Victorian novel. But her latest book couldn’t be further from those gothic prisons and asylums of nineteenth century Birmingham.
Like ‘Cora…’ the title is one of those clever, camouflage titles that can present with more than one meaning. Here it is the literal and the metaphoric. Publication of When We Fall is to coincide with the 75th anniversary of VE day and has at its base the, perhaps, lesser known WWII atrocity, the Katyn massacre.
Several years ago I stayed in Krakow and spent many an hour wandering the city. There is a wooden cross erected in one of the many squares, simple, with one word on it - Katyn. On the day I walked past a Polish lady was standing in front of the monument, her head bowed in silent prayer. In my ignorance I thought it might be St. Katyn, a feast day perhaps. How wrong could I be? Fortunately curiosity got the better of me and I did some cursory research. What I read shocked me, of course.
So I came to this book with a little prior knowledge, of what to expect maybe? What I actually got exceeded expectations……..
‘England, 1943. Lost in fog, pilot Vee Katchatourian is forced to make an emergency landing where she meets enigmatic RAF airman Stefan Bergel, and then can't get him out of her mind.
In occupied Poland, Ewa Hartman hosts German officers in her father's guest house, while secretly gathering intelligence for the Polish resistance. Mourning her lover, Stefan, who was captured by the Soviets at the start of the war, Ewa is shocked to him on the street one day.
Haunted by a terrible choice he made in captivity, Stefan asks Vee and Ewa to help him expose one of the darkest secrets of the war. But it is not clear where everyone's loyalties lie until they are tested...
Published to coincide with the 75th anniversary of VE Day and based on WWII war atrocity the Katyn massacre, When We Fall is a moving story of three lives forever altered by one fatal choice.’
What that fatal choice is I refuse to divulge as I don’t do spoilers, you’re going to have to read the book for yourself. But it is an absorbing read. Not only are we are treated to a swashbuckling world war two story that is gripping and exciting but it also highlights one of those chilling events of war that can go under the radar unless writers like Ms. Kirby draws our attention to them.
The research, as ever, is impeccable. You feel as if you’re in the cockpit with Vee . I can only presume that Carolyn Kirby actually flew a plane to achieve this level of palpability. You can hear the throb of the propellors and the stuttering reluctance of the engines. You can smell the oily engineery odours of old aircraft. You can smell the sweat of the officer’s mess. The reading becomes a sensory experience almost.
The triad of characters is complex. I found myself sceptical and mistrusting of Stefan. It was as if Vee and Ewa were pawns. They are well defined characters in a tightly woven plot. Great to have two strong female characters in a war story. But none of these components have any worth unless thery are embedded in an effective narrative.
Trust me they are.
My thanks to Paru of No Exit Press and Oldcastle Books for a proof.
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