Books & Java

Stella Bain

by Anita Shreve  

Synopsis:

When an American woman, Stella Bain, is found suffering from severe shell shock in an exclusive garden in London, surgeon August Bridge and his wife selflessly agree to take her in.


A gesture of goodwill turns into something more as Bridge quickly develops a clinical interest in his houseguest. Stella had been working as a nurse's aide near the front, but she can't remember anything prior to four months earlier when she was found wounded on a French battlefield.


In a narrative that takes us from London to America and back again, Shreve has created an engrossing and wrenching tale about love and the meaning of memory, set against the haunting backdrop of a war that destroyed an entire generation.

My Review:

Excellent book with a very unique story about a woman suffering shell-shock during WWI and her attempt to regain her life afterwards or rather to re-invent her life stronger and with a clearer understanding of who she is, her strengths, what she can handle. There are a lot of characters who contribute to her own understanding of herself, including a horrible husband who ironically is the reason she begins the journey to re-invent herself. 

I completely related to the story of a woman whose poor marriage choice at a young age finds herself in a place to not be defined by that choice but rather muster all of her strength of character to re-invent herself in the image of the person she knows is the best person she can be. 

The book starts off a bit confusing and I was not sure during the first 50 pages or so if I was going to "get into it". But I'm glad I hung on and kept reading because it was well worth it. Great story of a woman who is strong, admirable, and well ahead of her early 1900 contemporaries and their role as helpless women as a consequence of the events and mentalities of the time.