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After reading this book, I can definitively say it went over and above my expectations and is in my view, the best book of the ones I have read by this author. It documents the life of Tully, an independent teenager growing up in a poverty-stricken area with a lifetime of abuse and neglect behind her.
The writing in this book is not exquisite Woolf-esque prose but it matches Tully's character; blunt, to the point and it puts across the situation. Tully lives through the suicide of a childhood friend, Jennifer and summons all her strength to embark on a social work degree. The story is turbulent, through the misery of Tully's young life and the resulting confusion as well as a continuing sense of wrongness in her adult life.
In many ways Tully left me distraught. The amount of times I was reduced to tears was evened out but simply laughing at her manner and her rugged determination to right the wrongs that had been done to her through her work with foster children. We are often reminded of the years that Tully used her dancing talents and although these are never outwardly discussed in detail, we do learn about her dancing past through the sexual power she continues to hold over her male counterparts.
When Jennifer's true love returns to town, Tully wants to hate him. It is obvious from the beginning, however, that he (Jack) holds the magnetism which obsessed Jennifer and later another friend, Shakie. It is likely that Tully would have gone the same way if not for her stoic temperament, where her life had taught her to deal with anything else.
The ending of this book devastated me but I could see why it happened. I would definitely recommend this book over and above The Bronze Horseman series.
This is the third and final book in the trilogy of Tatiana and Alexander as they finally find their life in America, but there is still much more drama to come. To be honest, once I got about a third of the way through this book, I was completely sick of the series, sick of the characters who had no depth and sick of the endless unrealistic twists where the family still seemed to be constantly at risk. While I think the first or the second book of this series would have served in the place of all three, this may have been a circumstance where a publisher was demanding a trilogy. To me, the characters and plot lines were entirely dried up by this book and the author seemed to be clutching at straws.
That said, I am not doing the writing talents of this author justice. I am told, Tully which I have yet to read is absolutely amazing so I will hold off on that. I think I would have enjoyed this book far more, had it been written about characters or plots that I found more believable. The author did display interesting characters in Anthony and Vikki and also displayed an interesting twist for the reader near the end of the book. It did seem like the relationship, complex as it was between Tatiana and Alexander took up the bulk of the book and this resulted in too many characters being introduced too late in the book to end with a naive sense of sentimentality and a random discussion about a defence strategy that seemed to have no place with the rest of the book.
I did enjoy the flashbacks to Tania's childhood which provided a welcome relief from the constant drivel about the relationship. A love it seems that had to survive through rape, abuse and pure nastiness. A look back into Tania's childhood did answer some more questions about her character and I believe a more detailed look into her character and perhaps more of a building up of it would have done the book more justice.
Of the trilogy, I enjoyed The Bridge to Holy Cross the most as it provided the wartime memories which the first book was about as well as having a believable love story and a good ending.
This is the sequel to The Bronze Horseman, set in Russia and New York as Tatiana, believing her husband is dead attempts to forget her life in Russia and create a new life for herself and her son, Anthony in New York. Meanwhile Alexander is tried by the NKGB and placed in prison after prison before being released to a penal battalion continually forced into situations that seem impossible to remedy (which of course Alexander gets them out of being a big he-man hero and all). As the war draws to a close and Tatiana begins to see inconsistencies in Alexander's death, she begins investigating his disappearance. Her hope fades and she begins to make other personal relationships only to discover that despite having escaped a war that seemed inescapable, she is still faced with terrors she thought she had left in the Soviet Union.
After reading this book, I can definitively say that I think this could have served the purpose the first book did, as a love story. This is especially considering that it went over (in memories) the events of the first book, the necessary events that had created the scenario in this book. I also enjoyed this book far more than the first book, as the events it explained (in the first part at least) were far more realistic and were depicted in a far better way. However, I do not admire anyone who will leave their son with a friend to make their way to the communist Soviet Union, especially not if you are wanted there, as romantic as it is seen to be, I think it is also incredibly cruel to risk one's own life at the expense of a kid never knowing his mother or father but again I probably don't know enough to be making a blanket statement.Maybe my complaint on this is just indicative of the fact that the plot was very wind-y which can be good but did not suit the tone of this book, in my opinion.
I still enjoyed the book very much and would recommend it over and above the first book.
This book is a love story set during the time of the Nazi invasion of the (then) Soviet Union. Tatiana lives with her family in Leningrad and is sent out for food on the day of the announcement of the Nazi invasion. This is when she meets Alexander Belov, a captain in the Red Army who happens to also be going out with her sister. The story progresses and the Nazis get closer and closer to Leningrad until they barricade it off, leaving Tatiana and her family without necessary food and less necessary vodka. Alexander watches as rations decrease more and more and throughout the winter when people start to die. When Tatiana and her sister Dasha finally make it out, the story increasingly becomes a love story set against a backdrop of bomb blasts, low rations and the ever-present fear of discovery.
My (new) flatmate lent me this book. This series is one of her favourites. I enjoyed parts of it, and other parts less so. The book starts off realistically but as the love story spirals out of control so do the historical inaccuracies and the unlikely scenarios that Tatiana and Alexander find themselves in. A part of the book towards the end consists of 100 pages of just sex and nothing else. Although the desire in this book makes sense, the presence of this and the absence of any other part of the setting made me believe it less. The two main characters, for me, were also not believable. Tatiana seemed to reserve herself and then dramatically come out of her shell, she then fell pregnant after months and months of starvation. Some people are incredibly fertile, but not that fertile. The likelihood that she could then also suffer what she did and come out nearly unscathed was also unrealistic.
Despite this, I do realise that this story was above all a love story. The love part was done very well and with a good accuracy for the time (the notion of Alexander owning Tatiana did niggle my inner feminist a bit but it was like that back then I imagine). The continued reference to the book of poems which serves as hope not just through the poetry but also through the secretive storing of money was a nice image. The descriptions of Leningrad also built a good picture in my head and I would say they are also accurate as Simons grew up in Leningrad. I would recommend this book but people should keep in mind it is fiction, it is unrealistic in parts and it is above all else a love story. I'm currently reading the sequel.
