Letters From Home

Image of Letters from Home
Author(s): 
Release Date: 
November 25, 2013
Publisher/Imprint: 
Entangled Publishing
Pages: 
84
Reviewed by: 

The ravages of war can be horrendous, both physically as well as emotionally, and nowhere is this more evident than in this true-to-life story about three close friends and their love for the men who served our country during World War II.

Blonde bombshell Betty Cordell is a waitress by day and sings at USO dances at night. One night Betty’s friends, Julia Renard and Liz Stevens, go to see her perform; two brothers, soon to ship out, strike up a conversation with Julia and Liz. Even though Liz has been dating Dalton Harris for a while and is hoping he will pop the question, she finds herself drawn to handsome older brother, Morgan McLain. Leaving him for a moment, she returns to find Betty in his arms. She departs without giving Morgan her name, realizing how silly it is to be attracted to him. She does not know Morgan has just rescued Betty from a drunken soldier.

Betty arrives home telling Liz that Morgan gave her his military address, wanting her to write, not knowing Liz has befriended him. Betty, not the scholar Liz is, pressures Liz to correspond with Morgan pretending to be her. Not long afterward, Betty recognizes something is missing in her life and, adrift with no real family, decides to join the Army. She dreams of travel to exotic locations, but finds herself stationed in the torrid swamps of Dutch New Guinea.

Roommate Julia Renard, a college student who dreams of being a fashion designer, is engaged to Navy officer Christian Downing. When offered a prestigious internship with Vogue in New York, she reluctantly declines. It is 1944, and women center their lives around marriage and children. Though somewhat distressed, her heart tells her to remain in Chicago to await Christian’s release.

Meanwhile, soon after Betty’s departure, Liz’s letters to Morgan have them developing a deep and personal relationship. When Dalton asks her to marry him, she accepts, believing he is her destiny, and realizing Morgan believes her to be Betty.

Ms. McMorris penned her debut novel inspired by the love letters her grandparents wrote while her grandfather served in World War II. This poignant novel digs deep into the emotional and physical effects of war and is well written and well researched. Readers might wonder whether it was customary for a farewell letter by a soldier to be written before his death. Evidently, even to this day, soldiers write farewell letters for a comrade to send to their family in case of death. On occasion during WW II—because the war created chaos in whatever communications systems were in place—a farewell letter or a radio broadcast of a casualty list might reach families before an official government emissary could. Poignant indeed.

One small quibble with the story is that young women mainly lived with their parents until they married—but the author does make it clear that their lifestyles were not necessarily the norm, perhaps adding to the uniqueness of the characters drawn. Otherwise, the author’s sprinkling of similes and metaphors throughout the text offers insightful descriptions of scenery and location as well as to the attire and mannerisms of the era. The heart-tugging scenes interspersed throughout Letters from Home serve to highlight the harsh realities of both war and human nature.