The Ship of Brides - Hardcover

Moyes, Jojo

3.86

43,567 ratings by Goodreads

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0340830093 ISBN 13: 9780340830093

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton, 2005

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The year is 1946, and all over the world young women are crossing the seas in their thousands en route to the men they married in wartime, and an unknown future.

In Sydney, Australia, four women join 650 other brides on an extraordinary voyage to England - aboard HMS Victoria, which still carries not just arms and aircraft but a thousand naval officers and men.

Rules of honour, duty, and separation are strictly enforced, from the aircraft carrier's Captain down to the lowliest young stoker. But the men and the brides will find their lives intertwined in ways the Navy could never have imagined.

And Frances Mackenzie - the enigmatic young bride whose past comes back to haunt her thousands of miles from home - will find that sometimes the journey is more important than the destination.

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Review:

Fascinating read...not only is THE SHIP OF BRIDES utterly compelling, it's educational. In a good way. (Heat)

Wonderfully romantic and moving. (Daily Mail)

'Irresistibly absorbing . . . A sure-fire winner and her best since SHELTERED RAIN.' (Sarah broadhurst, Bookseller)

The Ship of Brides is a wonderful read: a tale of fate and destiny that remains utterly unsentimental. (Sunday Express)

'Romance with a difference' (Woman & Home)

Gloriously entertaining (Mirror )

Engaging and poignant...Moyes writes both dialogue and descriptive passages with charm. (Glasgow Herald)

It says a lot for the author's storytelling powers that this classy family drama had me utterly engrossed, deeply involved with the characters and caring madly about their fate. (Australian Woman's Weekly on THE PEACOCK EMPORIUM)

'Irresistibly absorbing . . . A sure-fire winner and her best since SHELTERED RAIN.' (Sarah Broadhurst, Bookseller)

From the Author:

The Ship of Brides is based on a true story, that of my Australian grandmother's journey to meet my Scottish grandfather after the war. During a chance conversation, she happened to mention that unlike most war brides, she and 600 others did not travel on the troopships or liners familiar to most people, but aboard an aircraft carrier, with 1000 men and aircraft still aboard.
Curious, I tried to find out more about this voyage, but with little initial success. In the end, through the use of Australian and English newspapers from 1946, journals, letters and reference books, and help from the Royal Navy, I slowly pieced the voyage together.
I think all great stories have tension at the heart of them, and here I could imagine the tension between the very male, regimented world of the navy and the giddy young brides, the tension within and between these young women, some as young as 15, who had hitched themselves to men they hardly knew - and a reception that was by no means guaranteed. And then my grandmother told me about a marine that used to stand outside her door and guard her cabin - and I saw a love story in the making.
Writing Ship of Brides was a fascinating experience - not just opening my eyes to the bravery of these young women, but also to my own family history. During a book tour of Australia last year I met many more of the original brides, who loved the book, and all had stories I wish I had been able to include. (Somehow my grandmother had decided not to tell me about the nit outbreak on board, or that many brides had to meet their husbands with their heads doused in paraffin!). I hope readers find it illuminating - more importantly, I hope they just get lost in the story. Even without my fictional recreation, I think it is a good one.
Jojo Moyes

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