This book feels so much of the time about which it is written, the years immediately after World War I, in an England trying to deal with the terrible loss of so many young men as well as the wounding and continuing suffering of so many others. The story involves the circumstances surrounding the death of a troubled war veteran who had been hospitalized with a question of "nerves". Why would he have killed himself? The family wants to know. They turn to another former soldier, himself with menta More...

Having listed this book initially as two-star, I have since degraded it to one. The only reason I finished it was because of my determination to get through my book challenge.

There were parts that I liked, Speller has a lovely way of recreating the world as it was left after the devastation of the first world war and I loved learning about things that I hadn't known had happened during the war, however I still feel like I don't quite know what the book was about.

First of all, something that is More...

Two years after the end of the Great War, Laurence Bartram, an officer traumatized by his experience of a modern battlefield, is trying unsuccessfully to rebuild his life when he is approached by Mary, a childhood acquaintance who is trying to understand the suicide of her brother.

Bartram's investigations lead him to discover a cluster of deaths among a group of ex-soldiers, all of whom were connected with the court-martial and execution of an officer for cowardice. Mary's brother had commanded More...

C2010. FWFTB: 1920, war, investigate, sister, letter. Whoah – this was an enthralling read. From the first page, I was drawn in and hardly came up for air until I finished the book. I usually stay away from books about the Great War, as along with many many others, relatives of mine were not to survive this ‘war to end all wars’ or, if they did, it influenced the rest of their lifetimes. Echoes of this war are heard and shadows seen almost every day thanks to the memorials that grace every villa More...

'The Return of Captain John Emmett' tells the story of an incident during the Great War. Laurence Bartram, himself consumed by grief at the loss of his wife and young son, is approached by a friend's wife to unravel the mystery of why he committed suicide. His investigations lead to the gradual piecing-together of an army execution. Similar to a detective mystery, most of the action is told by reports from characters who were at the scene, very much like examining the scene of a crime. In the no More...

Laurence Bartram is asked by the sister of a friend if he can look into and explain why her brother committed suicide. What seems like a simple story, young man comes home from the trenches of WWI suffering from shell-shock and cannot cope with civilian life, becomes more and more complicated. It moves effortlessly into becoming a murder mystery.

This book started out as a 5* story for me but about 2/3 of the way through it became over complicated and top heavy. Too many coincidences, too much un More...

Set in 1920 London, this mystery intertwines the horrors of World War I in a tangle web of war survivors, murders, romance, social customs and history. Recovering from the trauma of both serving in the war and losing a wife and child, Laurence Bartram receives news of the suicide death of a classmate, Captain John Emmett. Shocked, Laurence comes to the aid of his sister to discover the why of the suicide and his bequests to unknown individuals in his will. Laurence falls hopelessly in love with More...

The Return of Captain John Emmett by Elizabeth Speller is a haunting story of lost men during a lost time--a story the lost generation of soldiers who only semi-returned from the trench warfare of World War I, and the between-the-wars limbo that was the 1920's.

Today we call it "Post Traumatic Stress Disorder" or PTSD, as if giving things a name makes them easier to live with. In the immediate aftermath of WWI, it was simply called "shell-shock", as though the shorter name meant it could be dismi More...

This enjoyable read is now fading from my memory and I fear I’ll no longer be able to do it justice in a review. It’s not flawless in terms of plot - there are, I think, just too many threads woven into the mystery, and certainly too many coincidental meetings and connections—especially the climactic appearance of the One Who Dunnit at exactly the right (or wrong?) moment. And then there seemed to be an editorial error as he greeted the protagonist not by his own name but by someone else’s!

But More...

The end of World War I was a traumatic time for Britain, even though they won. Hundreds of thousands of men died, and more than a million came back wounded. Family dynamics changed, the roles of women changed, everyone who survived sought ways to carry on and cope with a world that had changed around them. At the same time, the Golden Age in mystery fiction began.

Elizabeth Speller brings all of these elements together in her debut novel, The Return of Captain John Emmett. It's a wonderful story More...

Excellent historical fiction with a mystery tinge; taking place several years after the end of the Great War and dealing with the effects on it on various characters, both survivors and families of dead soldiers.

The storyline seems simple: Laurence Bartram who returned whole physically but crushed mentally from the war, though not because of the events he participated in but because of tragedy home, is approached by the young sister of his best school friend John Emmett who took a semi-orphan La More...

So - a brooding mystery set after WWI - precisely the kind of thing that engenders me to enjoy this book. And I did (though it's probably more of a 3 1/2 star). Anyway, what I liked:

First, the characterizations were right on. The main character, Laurence, reminded me a bit of Ian Rutledge, except he's not seeing/talking to ghosts. He's definitely a man damaged but not destroyed by the war, and I also liked that he was not trained as a detective and could make mistakes. I would argue that the oth More...

Ah...The Return of Captain John Emmett...it's a little bit Maisie Dobbs a little bit Ian Rutledge, a little bit Regeneration triliogy with a dash of the for God and country innocence and awakening of R.F. Delderfield. It has an intriguing start followed by weak plotting but I still enjoyed it very much. It's not trashy at all so it doesn't count as guilty pleasure but I am a bit stymied by how much I liked it given what a pedestrian novel it is.


Captain Emmett has managed to survive World War One More...

A schoolboy’s scarf, a hair clasp, and an old photograph are practically all that remain of a young soldier’s life when he returns to Britain after the war. His family and his neighbors all suspect that even his sanity is lost. Captain John Emmett’s younger sister contacts Laurence, John’s old school chum, after John’s death, apparently by suicide, to see if Laurence can tell her why young Emmett had to die. The author, Elizabeth Speller, does a good job with this material. She manages to evoke More...

"The Return of Captain John Emmett" is an excellent mystery, the twists and turns and surprising revelations come thick and fast. The sort of book which can keep you reading far into the night, and regret having to go to work. However, excellent mystery that this is, it is more than just another historical mystery. The novel also faithfully explores the realities of the aftermath of war, the effect upon a country and it's people.

As Laurence Bartram delves into the life and particularly the war o More...

The Return of Captain John Emmett by Elizabeth Speller is both an engrossing mystery and a look at the aftermath of WWI in England that "grabbed" me at the beginning and kept me guessing until the end.

Laurence Bartram has returned to England, having lost both wife and child in childbirth while he was away fighting in the trenches of France. Most of his contemporaries have either been killed in battle or irrevocably changed. Lawrence himself is adrift and aimless, alienated from everyone except h More...

Laurence Bartram survived the Great War, but his experiences as a soldier and the death of his wife and infant son while he was at the front led him to retreat from the world once he returned home. When Mary Emmett, the sister of his old school friend John Emmett, writes to ask Laurence to help her uncover the reasons behind her brother's suicide, Laurence accepts. While Emmett's death seems straight forward on the surface it turns out it is anything but. Laurence's quest to find answers for Mar More...

I think I have found a new favourite genre - historical fiction. This one is set in the 1920s. Rather than focusing on the glamour of the 20s it centralises round the after affects of the war. It made for an interesting read and I have a list of classics from that era that I now plan on reading. The book felt well researched and indeed the author lists a number of history books that she used as research. I liked that fact that it dealt with some issues that I think people struggle with today. Sh More...

I picked this up in the library thinking it was about the aftermath of the Great War. In a sense it was, but mostly it was a sort of detective story, and I see that there's a follow-up too.

There were bits of this book that I really enjoyed. The mystery at the centre of it (which I won't detail because it will spoil it) was based on a subject which I've long found extremely moving. Some of the story around the treatment of soldiers in instituations also I found moving and fascinating, though fra More...

I really wanted to like this book, and some of it I did. Speller's evocation of the world during and after WW1 was really quite strong. She seems to understand well how people are damaged by war, and the ways people try and sometimes fail to cope with the horrors they experience. It reminded me of The Postmistress in that way. (Both strong in history but weaker in fiction.)

Her main character, though, was a bit dim. He did have a sparky friend in Charles and some finely drawn new acquaintances in More...

I really enjoyed reading this book, and it was heading for four stars until I got to chapter 36, when it abruptly dropped at least half a star. "The new Birdsong -- only better" claims a quote from The Independent on the cover. Ridiculous. Of course they address many of the same themes, but this book is completely different from Birdsong and can't sensibly be compared with it.
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The slow start draws the reader in to Laurence's post-war life, wondering what has happened to his wife and child, what h (hide spoiler)] More...

My mom checked this book out the library and then encouraged me to do the same, so that she would have someone to talk about it with!

I really enjoyed it, as did she, but we agreed that it could have used a little editing help as it was very confusing at times. The author has woven a complex tapestry out of many different threads but occasionally those threads get lost, or seem to be snarled, or to have disappeared, or to have appeared out of nowhere.

But don't let that put you off if you find th More...

This was a very promisng debut novel, from this talented author. Starting with the negatives.......far too many coincidences in the plot to make it beliveable. Whilst I happily suspend belief when reading, too many coincidences are irriatating, and detract from the plot. Granted a certain amout of coincidence was necessary to move the plot along, but at times this bordered on the absurd-and there was no need for it as the author clearly has a vivid enough imagination.

But other than that, it was More...

I could have liked this book a whole lot more. It is just that it always seemed to lose its way just when it was on a roll. You know the books that are hard to get started but if you stick with it for a few pages or a chapter or two suddenly you are rewarded with a great story that you can't put down.

Well...that's not what happened here. The book started out really good and drew me right in. I thought I had hit a real winner in all ways. It went on for almost half the book and then, nothing. It More...

Lawrence Bartram comes home from World War I as a changed man in a changed world. His wife and son have died while he was off fighting, and when an old schoolmate’s sister asks for help, Bartram decides to help her figure out why her brother might have committed suicide. This is a quiet book that builds tension as Bartram finds himself going deeper and deeper into the wounded psyche of soldiers, officers, civilians, all of whom have been shell-shocked by the Great War.
As intriguing as is the m More...

Shell shock - psychological disturbance caused by prolonged exposure to active warfare, especially being under bombardment, origin - First World War (Oxford Dictionary).

This novel is about the effects of shell shock on soldiers, and how very misunderstood these effects were by the military, the medical profession and families. This was a war unlike any form of war before and it changed forever the way wars were conducted. But as with all war, it is not the generals and commanders who bear the b More...

For the past couple of years I've come to enjoy the interwar period a great deal. This is due largely in part to Jacqueline Winspear's Maisie Dobbs series and Charles Todd's Inspector Rutledge series. And although I have no idea if Elizabeth Speller plans to make a series out of her newest novel, I would be all for it.

Speller's novel, The Return of Captain John Emmett, has Laurence Bartram, a veteran of the war and living in London, involved in trying to find out what happened to his old school More...

Settling back into civilian life was never going to be easy for Laurence Bartram. Haunted by the deaths of his wife and baby son, and by his experiences at the Front during the First World War, he struggles to find any enthusiasm for writing a book on London churches. It isn’t surprising that he is intrigued when Mary Emmett, the sister of a childhood friend, asks him to investigate her brother’s suicide. As he delves into Captain Emmett’s past, Laurence uncovers more mysterious deaths and dark More...

I wanted to like this book, and my rating does not do it justice, I'm afraid, but the simple fact of the matter was that I could not finish it. I stopped a little over a third of the way through. Even though I have this 'thing' about not finishing a book, especially one I paid for, once I put it down, I felt no desire to pick it up again. The story moved very slowly, and I found after a few weeks I couldn't really remember much about it, and I would have had to re-read to bring myself back into More...