On My Nightstand - The Postmistress

The Postmistress - By Sarah Blake

On the back cover:

In 1940, Iris James is the postmistress in coastal Franklin, Massachusetts. Iris knows more about the townspeople than she will ever say, and believes her job is to deliver secrets. Yet one day she does the unthinkable: slips a letter into her pocket, reads it, and doesn't deliver it.
Meanwhile, Frankie Bard broadcasts from overseas with Edward R. Murrow. Her dispatches beg listeners to pay heed as the Nazis bomb London nightly. Most of the townspeople of Franklin think the war can't touch them. But both Iris and Frankie know better...
The Postmistress is a tale of two worlds-one shattered by violence, the other wilfully naïve-and of two women whose job is to deliver the news, yet who find themselves unable to do so. Through their eyes, and the eyes of everyday people caught in history's tide, it examines how stories are told, and how the fact of war is borne even through everyday life.

My thoughts:

I have read a lot of books in the past year / year and a half set in World War II; the thing I like about all of them, is they are all from very different perspectives, covering very different parts of the war.  Needless to say, I have learned more about the war in reading all these books than I ever did in school.

Maybe it is because when you are reading historical fiction, it puts a much more real element to the war, something that is hard to achieve in a history class / book.

I found the parts about the war fascinating; I really hope most of that is true because if it is, I learned a lot.  But I honestly did not think the book was titled properly, nor was the back of the book description really accurate to what the book is really about.  This book has so little to do with the Postmistress and way more to do with everyday people handling their emotions and issues with the war.

But still read it – it is a great book – just not titles properly.

My rating: 4 out of 5.