what I’m reading: last christmas in paris by hazel gaynor and heather webb.

When the Great War breaks out in 1914, everyone predicts it will be over by Christmas. As Evie’s brother, Will, and his best friend, Thomas, leave to fight in the war, the trio makes plans to spend Christmas in Paris. But the war is not over by Christmas and Evie and Thomas will spend the next 4 years writing to each other and to family and friends, waiting for the war to be over.

I read this book because I thought it would be a Christmas themed novel. However, it’s not really a Christmas or holiday novel. The main characters mark the passing of each year by Christmas as they had planned to spend Christmas together when they thought the war would be over quickly. There’s not a huge focus on Christmas in the book, other than the friends being unable to spend it together.

Despite it not being holiday themed, I still enjoyed the book. This book is told in the epistolary style of letters between Evie and Thomas during World War I. As they write to each other over the years, they become closer and closer, each telling the other about their hopes and fears. Evie comes from a privileged family and is desperate to do her part for the war efforts. War is depicted through Tom’s letters in all its horror.

I thought the letters describing World War I were fascinating. I haven’t read much about World War I so some of the details mentioned were completely new to me. Tom’s letters describe new-fangled army machines like tanks and machine guns and new ways of fighting like chemical warfare. What we now call PTSD was called ‘war neuroses’ and soldiers who suffered from it were described as ‘weak-minded’.

Evie was a delight to read about, what with her gallivanting around the countryside on her bicycle and her scandalous job as a postmistress. Frustrated by the false reports that everything is fine on the front, Evie soon finds herself writing a column for the newspaper telling the truth of the war from a women’s perspective.

So, while the title was a bit misleading, I still enjoyed this book about letters between friends during World War I, with a little bit of romance thrown in.