The Daughters of Mars - Hardcover

Keneally, Thomas

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1476734615 ISBN 13: 9781476734613

Publisher: Atria Books, 2013

Synopsis

From the acclaimed author of Schindler’s List, the epic, unforgettable story of two sisters from Australia, both trained nurses, whose lives are transformed by the cataclysm of the first World War.

From the acclaimed author of Schindler’s List comes the epic, unforgettable story of two sisters whose lives are transformed by the cataclysm of the First World War.

IN 1915, Naomi and Sally Durance, two spirited Australian sisters, join the war effort as nurses, escaping the confines of their father’s farm and carrying a guilty secret with them. Though they are used to tending the sick, nothing could have prepared them for what they confront, first on a hospital ship near Gallipoli, then on the Western Front.

Yet amid the carnage, the sisters become the friends they never were at home and find them­selves courageous in the face of extreme danger and also the hostility from some on their own side. There is great bravery, humor, and compassion, too, and the inspiring example of the remarkable women they serve alongside. In France, where Naomi nurses in a hospital set up by the eccen­tric Lady Tarlton while Sally works in a casualty clearing station, each meets an exceptional man: the kind of men for whom they might give up some of their newfound independence—if only they all survive.

At once vast in scope and extraordinarily intimate, The Daughters of Mars brings World War I vividly to life from an uncommon perspec­tive. Thomas Keneally has written a remarkable novel about suffering and transcendence, despair and triumph, and the simple acts of decency that make us human even in a world gone mad.

About this title

Product Description:

Unusual book

Review:

"No Australian author has written more eloquently or extensively of war than Tom Keneally...Now, at last and triumphantly, there is a full-scale Keneally novel of the Great War...All of it is handled by Keneally with calm mastery. If epic is no longer a literary category that fits this world, THE DAUGHTERS OF MARS nonetheless has a tragic and humane span that few recent novels have attempted, let alone equalled." (Canberra Times)

"Keneally, for decades one of Australia's most prominent and exuberant storytellers, has a passion for history that is infectious and irresistible. His new novel tackles - on an epic scale - the role of Australian nurses in World War I...Keneally's fascination with the roles of ordinary people like these young women play in momentous events gives THE DAUGHTERS OF MARS its terrific energy and freshness." (Adelaide Advertiser)

"The huge talents of Thomas Keneally are everywhere on display." (The Guardian)

"The translation into fiction of all that he uncovered is one of this novel's finest achievements. You sense a storymaker with his manuscript pegged out and in play, dotting in tiny facts, intricate details: innovations in medical practice and anaesthetics, even the different fashions worn by Australia's different state nurses. Here, he drops in the artistic philosophy of light; there, the surreality of travel to famous places; and then, the death of Joan of Arc, in five perfect paragraphs. The breadth and accretion of all this is dazzling, matched - and sometimes superseded - by the perfection of the intimate gestures and internal moments through which he vivifies his young women. What grief looks like as it works across somebody's lips; how human touch feels to someone more used to swabbing and stitching." (The Australian)

"The skill of Tom Keneally is that he writes with a large scope on matters from the Irish diaspora to convict life in Australia, the Holocaust and now World War I, but his stories are engagingly intimate." (The Daily Telegraph)

About this edition

• Publisher: Atria Books
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 1476734615
• ISBN 13: 9781476734613
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 517