Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks

I bought this book mainly because I am keen on warfare and its effect on people etc etc. This is the first novel I'd read on the first world war having read a couple of historical accounts etc which were good from a battle point of view and knowing what went on but were short on emotional impact I thought. The first 100 pages were not what I was expecting and is set in France in 1910 when an Englishman by the name of Stephen is sent by his textile factory to come to France and learn new things about the business. He is housed by the family of a factory owner and falls in love with the owners wife. The story follows the twists and turns of Stephen's ...  Read the complete review

There are some books, where after I have read them, I am compelled to consult my bookshelves and re-read another book that echoes the plot or style of the one I have just read. After reading ‘Birdsong’, I re-read ‘All Quiet on the Western Front’. One of these, I concluded, is a great novel and the other I’m afraid, just falls short of greatness. It is 1910, and Stephen Wraysford is visiting a small town in France on business. He stays with a local textile entrepreneur and his family, the Azaires’. During his stay he falls in love with Madam Azaire, and she reciprocates the feeling. They elope, but ...  Read the complete review

This is an outstanding novel. The quality of Sebastian Faulks' writing is brilliant, and the story kept me engrossed to the (almost) final page (see below). While the novel is not flawless as an introduction to literature about WW1 this is a brilliant novel. The story follows Stephen Wraysford from being a young man having a passionate love affair while working in France to his enlisitng and service in WW1 as an officer. Of particular note in this novel are the passages which follow the 'sappers', the miners who laid explosives under the German trenches and the conditions they faced. Faulks' skill really comes out here. The story is followed right through to ...  Read the complete review

This is a wide ranging novel, whose overall theme would seem to be that there is no end to what men can endure. Throughout the novel, pain and fear are the dominant feelings; mud and blood are the prominent visuals. Although this is typically considered a great novel, I am not convinced that I enjoyed reading this novel, because I, personally, prefer a different style of writing. Stephen Wraysford is a young man visiting Amiens, France in 1910 at the start of the novel. Soon, he becomes enthralled by the wife of his host, a young woman trapped in a loveless, passionless marriage, and the first part of the novel is concerned with their passionate journey together. ...  Read the complete review

There have been many books about the First World War, but Birdsong is one of the best I have read. A few years ago, I was asked to curate an online exhibition of letters home from soldiers who had fought in the First World War, including some that had eventually fallen at Ypres and the Somme. I had to read many heart-wrenching letters that highlighted the awful drabness of life in the trenches, punctuated by moments of extreme, disabling horror. The ennervating effect of life under fire, in a state of almost constant terror, is captured with absolute authenticity by Faulks in this book, and there are many grim passages. The indomatibility of the ...  Read the complete review