Love In The Blitz Greatest Lost Love

by Eileen Alexander

On July 17th 1939, Eileen Alexander, a bright young woman recently graduated from Girton College, Cambridge, begins a brilliant correspondence with fellow Cambridge student Gershon Ellenbogen that lasts five years and spans many hundreds of letters.

But as Eileen and Gershon’s relationship flourishes from friendship and admiration into passion and love, the tensions between Germany, Russia, and the rest of Europe reach a crescendo. When war is declared, Gershon heads for Cairo and Eileen forgoes her studies to work in the Air Ministry.

As cinematic as Atonement, written with the intimacy of the Neapolitan quartet, Love in the Blitz is an extraordinary glimpse of life in London during World War II and an illuminating portrait of an ordinary young woman trying to carve a place for herself in a time of uncertainty. As the Luftwaffe begins its bombardment of England, Eileen, like her fellow Britons, carries on while her loved ones are called up to fight, some never to return home.

Written over the course of the conflict, Eileen’s letters provide a vivid and personal glimpse of this historic era. Yet throughout the turmoil and bloodshed, one thing remains constant: her beloved Gershon, who remains a source of strength and support, even after he, too, joins the fighting. Though his letters have been lost to time, the bolstering force of his love for Eileen is illuminated in her responses to him.

Equal parts heartrending and heartwarming, Love in the Blitz is a timeless romance and a deeply personal story of life and resilience amid the violence and terror of war.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, World War II, Memoir, Historical, Romance, War

496 pages, Hardcover

First published May 26, 2020

Reviews

[Maureen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a World War II memoir that came about when, following an impulse buy on eBay, David McGowan acquired a large quantity of War correspondence. Among this mixed lot were a series of love letters written by one Eileen Alexander to her boyfriend Gershon Ellenbogen during the Second World War. The letters (some 1400 of them) bring to life what it was like to live through those terrible years through Eileen’s eyes.

Eileen was extremely intelligent (a Cambridge student) and not without wit. In one letter she describes her facial features after a car accident - “My face is now fully exposed to the world and looks like the rear elevation of a baboon”!

Although there’s no question that I liked Eileen’s spirit, I found it difficult to relate to her in any other way, her sense of entitlement came across as arrogant at times. I did find some of the letters interesting, but at other times I became distracted, disinterested, and resorted to skimming through parts of it. I really wanted to love this book, and though it demonstrates the lost art of letter writing beautifully, unfortunately I found it hard going at times, and feel it would have benefited from some trimming.

*Thank you to Netgalley and William Collins for my ARC. I have given an honest unbiased review in exchange *

[Diane S ☔]

DNf on page 100. I usually like books in the for of letters, these though are one-sided. Which is also usually a problem in and of itself. I just can't connect and feel like I'm dragging myself to the finish line.

[8stitches 9lives · Rating 4 out of 5]

As it almost approaches the seventy-fifth anniversary of Victory in Europe (VE) Day, the day of Nazi Germany's surrender, this coming May there are myriad ways in which the population will be remembering those people actively involved in wartime activity yet this book looks at things from a different perspective. I can't help but feel that Love in the Blitz is another way of addressing the stoicism and resolve we Brits upheld as we traversed the difficult times in a brutal and bloody war against an evil enemy. Not only that but in these tough days of lockdown and death parallels can be drawn between our spirit then and now, and I thought this memoir was both intimate and sprawling as the letters’ author, Eileen Alexander, penned her most revealing thoughts to her sweetheart who was, like many men, drafted into the RAF with this being the only means of contact at the time. They went on to become engaged, married and eventually had a child together.

This makes perfect Coronavirus reading to lift your mood and takes us back to a time when everything was simpler. Eileen’s letters to lover Gershon Ellenbogen are particularly interesting due to the place her wealthy family held in society and the ties to prominent members of government and those deemed celebrities at the time; however, we must remember that she led a privileged life compared to the general population. These connections meant she regularly opined on such people, their actions and both their private and public personas. She is also frank and brutally honest about her own thoughts and emotions too. At one of the bleakest times in British and world history, Ms Alexander reminds us that love can endure even the toughest of situations. Recommended to those who are searching for an alternative, original and moving method to look back in time to the days of World War II and the people who were there. Many thanks to William Collins for an ARC.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Eileen Alexander graduated with a first in English from Cambridge and came from a well-connected, Jewish family, who moved from Egypt to England, shortly before the outbreak of WWII. Coincidentally, while going from Cambridge to London, to meet her family, she was involved in a car accident. The driver was Gershon Ellenbogan, the son of devoutly Jewish parents from Liverpool. That accident, in 1938, left Gershon – who was accused of dangerous driving - upset that he would be seen as reckless, and his defence of events led to a minor press story. More importantly, it turned a friendship into love.

Although we are lucky that these letters, from Eileen Alexander to Gershon, written from the period of the accident, throughout the war, have been saved; sadly, there are no replies from Gershon himself. Therefore, this is a little bit like hearing half of a telephone call, when you can only really guess at the response. Still, without doubt, these are a fascinating record of the time and Eileen was an interesting correspondent, who did her utmost to keep Gershon amused and involved in her life back in Britain. Obviously, being Jewish, she did feel some disquiet of events, but, only once does she admit to fear. Having admitted this, she puts such thoughts away and shows only bravery and humour throughout the coming years. This is no small action, especially when invasion looked very possible.

I am always drawn to books set around the time of WWII, and sources such as these letters, actually written during the time, really reflect what was happening and how people who were there, felt about events. I found this a fascinating read and am glad I read these, often very moving, letters. I received a copy of this book from the publisher, via NetGalley, for review.

[❀⊱RoryReads⊰❀ · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 Stars, rounded up to 3.

The blurb for this book lead me to expect a World War II memoir, written in letters, by an intellectual Cambridge University graduate. Instead this is largely a series of soppy and often silly love letters. Eileen Alexander was an intelligent, well educated woman, but in love she was as overwrought and obsessed with the object of her affections as any teenage fan with a crush on a musician or movie star. There are a few descriptions of air raids, a sighting of actor John Gielgud, and some stories about Leslie Hore-Belisha, but the rest is gossip (much of it mean spirited) about her fellow students from Girton college, news of friends about whom little is known, and arguments with her parents and brother Dicky. She tells a couple of funny stories related to the office work she did early in the war, but it's not enough to make this interesting to people expecting a first hand account of London during The Blitz.

I think this would have been a better read with more detailed histories and descriptions of the friends who feature in many of the letters (what happened to Hamish Falconer?) and tighter editing.

[Val Robson · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a collection of letters written by Eileen Alexander, to her boyfriend, later husband, Gershon Ellenbogen, starting just before the outbreak of World War II and continuing throughout the war as they are separated.

Eileen has just got a First Class degree in English from Girton College, Cambridge and is due to return there to do research when suddenly the threat and declaration of war upends her plans and social life.

This book has a lot of potential in the detail of social history of this period as Eileen and her family rub shoulders with many influential people of the times that some readers will be familiar with. However, as this is only one side of the correspondence (the replies from Gershon to Eileen not having been found) and also much day-to-day chat about people unknown it is quite a slog to get through. I found myself skim reading just to get a gist of the story and to try and find the interesting bits about life during the war. I didn't really want to read page after page of dull interactions with her family members and friends.

I read this during the 2020 Covid19 lockdown and it was interesting to relate to Eileen's feeling as war turned their lives upside down and how initially they hoped it was for a short time but then it got worse and worse and went on for years. It made me wonder about our own situation as we approach week 7 of lockdown in the UK with no clear exit strategy on the horizon. And every day our expectations of how the future will be have to change a little for the worse. Maybe not the best book to read at this time.

This book could use a lot of editting and more of the commentary about what is happening with the war at times. I enjoyed learning more about the war in the commentary sections but would have liked more of this and less of the minutiae of the letters.

With thanks to NetGalley and 4th Estate and William Collins for a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

[The Library Lady · Rating 2 out of 5]

I got to page 200 or so, realized there were at least 200 pages more, and skimmed the rest.
This badly needed editing and annotations. There are fascinating details about many of the "dramatis personae" at the end of the book, but from the start you just swim in a sea of confusion amidst the Joans and the Sheilas. Alexander could be funny and witty, but parts of this could have been trimmed and not missed. And if you had a drinking game for every time she uses "Darling," you'd be totally plastered before the war even began.

[Gareth Russell · Rating 5 out of 5]

On 19 July 1939, the holiday trains out of a sweltering London had standing-room only. Back in the capital, the King and Queen gave a ball at Buckingham Palace as upper-class debutantes trooped to another round of parties, all of them destined that year to be judged inferior to the ball given at Blenheim Palace two weeks earlier for the coming-out into high Society of Lady Sarah Spencer-Churchill. Separating off from the other holidaying crowds escaping to breezes from the coast or in the north, the Alexander family settled into their summer home at Drumnadrochit on the western shores of Loch Ness, from where 22-year-old Eileen Alexander wrote a letter to her friend and fellow Cambridge graduate, Gershon Ellenbogen, a Liverpudlian who had taken a double First in Classics and Psychology and whose university friends included the tragic genius Alan Turing.

In her opening letter, Eileen assured Gershon that it had been the sun in their eyes and her dodgy directions that caused his recent car crash which saw her hurtling out of the automobile, breaking her nose and collarbone, and recuperating with a face swollen, in her own words, “like the rear elevation of a baboon”. Eileen was excitedly planning her autumnal return to Cambridge as a graduate student and she was basking in the glow of her first-class degree in English.

A year later, Eileen had a new tooth courtesy of her dentist, the swelling had subsided, but her dreams of a postgraduate were over. The trains out of London were again standing room only, however, this time they were packed with evacuee children. Many of last year's debutantes had traded in the famous lobster-and-champagne supper dances at the Ritz to volunteer as workers on the assembly lines for military aircraft at factories in Cricklewood and Sir Winston Churchill spotted Queen Elizabeth, no longer hosting debutante balls, but rather practising with a revolver in the Buckingham Palace gardens, intent, so she told him, on putting up a good fight in the face of the expected Nazi invasion. Eileen Alexander’s dreams of returning to study in Cambridge had been replaced by her new job for the Air Ministry in London, while her subpar driving companion Gershon had become her boyfriend, who volunteered for the RAF and was posted to work for British Military Intelligence in Cairo. The Second World War had upended everybody's plan by pitching the world into a time that Eileen felt was “suspended between an unborn tomorrow & dead yesterday”.

Hitherto, the counterfactual mental image of the future Queen Mother charging down the Mall, guns blazing like a regal Annie Oakley, hell-bent on taking out as many of the Wehrmacht as she could before they returned fire, might have been my personal favourite among the anecdotes conjured by the Second World War. However, it now has several competitors after reading “Love in the Blitz: The Greatest Lost Love Letters of the Second World War,” the edited collection, and first publication, of Eileen Alexander’s letters to her boyfriend overseas.

Eileen’s correspondence covers life during the Second World War against the backdrop of a love affair, both viewed through the eyes of an intellectually brilliant, ambitious, kind, and funny observer. It contains many observations about daily life in a London during the war years – we are told of how irksome it was to fit a gas mask into a handbag and that actress Vivien Leigh was superb as Lady Teazle in a radio broadcast of Sheridan’s “The School for Scandal”. The letters are, as one of their editors notes, close to “an uninhibited and unstoppable stream of consciousness … written from air-raid shelters, and office desks, on buses and station platforms, in hotel foyers and under hair-dryers”. In one, we gauge how deeply Eileen and Gershon had fallen in love since their relationship began; she tells him frankly, “I couldn’t live if anything happened were to happen to you, darling, simply because if I did, my personality would become more and more atrophied ... I shouldn’t suffer very long, my darling, because I’d simply go to a doctor and get a sleeping draught & take it all. It’s a matter of cold fact that I can’t live without you.”

As both a British subject and Jewish, the author did not doubt the moral validity of Britain's war against Nazism. Although it would be unjust to depict her views as one-dimensional. She was both patriotic, while being sharply critical of Toryism – for instance, “Darling,” she writes in one letter, “it is true that there are some Conservatives who are not unkind but that is either because they are muddled thinkers or because they are not really Conservatives.”

“Love in the Blitz” offers a portrait of devotion and resilience, in a memoir of hope, as much as of love. When Gershon despaired as the Blitz began, Eileen reassured him, “I don’t think Hitler will destroy London, because London, if its legs are blown away, is prepared to hobble on crutches.”

[Diane · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was given an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I truly wanted to LOVE this story. It sounded just my think, historical, gossipy and a love story. It isn't really a book though, it is more a collection of letters. After I got over that disappointment I found just like the Second World War, it went on and on and on and on. if you pick it up knowing what you are getting - a collection of letters, written by one well-to-do female, rather than a sweeping love story, it probably would have been less of a chore. Don't get me wrong I was really rooting for Eileen but goodness, there was so much gossip that was irrelevant to us the reader as we don't know these people as fully formed characters like we would if it was a novel. The war details left me cold, I thought first hand accounts from someone living through it would have been more moving. I am sorry if this review is too negative but it has been an ordeal to finish this and I found myself skip reading huge parts of it as I couldn't bare another "Today I had lunch at ..." I think in hindsight I should have read it in chunks rather than in one go. Am I glad I read it? Yes because i found it interesting to see how a girl/lady wrote and spoke in that era, it gives a great snapshot, but it took me forever to read.

[Murray · Rating 4 out of 5]

It definitely has its fascinating moments. If you like memoirs built on letters and correspondence in a time of war you will enjoy this one.

[Cathy Les · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was interesting to see WWII London through the eyes of someone who actually lived through it. The Alexanders were very well off and connected, which also makes it different from the other accounts I've read. I can't say that I liked Eileen though. By the end of the book, I was totally "Darling'd" out.

[Kathleen Flynn]

I really enjoyed this, despite my general aversion to books set during World War II and the fact that a one-sided series of letters set 80 years ago doesn't sound all that interesting. But it was, and entirely thanks to the voice of Eileen Alexander, a brilliant, vibrant and sometimes snarky young woman. All the letters are to Gershon, first her boyfriend, later her fiance and subsequently husband, and they paint a vivid picture not just of Eileen but of her world: wealthy, cosmopolitan, Jewish, English by way of Egypt.

Early on I kept being amazed by things: that this family friend "Leslie" whose office at the War Ministry she got a job in was actually Hore-Belisha, the War Minister himself! That Eileen turned out to own a car. (What 23-year-old owns their own car in 1940??) Also a farm in Wales, for reasons that still remained unclear to me after finishing the book. It is mentioned several times as specifically her farm, not her family's. That her friend Aubrey would go on to be a major figure in Israeli government. It was all sort of insane, but wonderful, like Eileen's habit of random capitalization, her way of making up names for things, her hilarious descriptions of people and conversations, and her ardent and often-expressed adoration of Gershon. All of it set against the backdrop of England at war -- the descriptions of life in the Blitz are also fascinating.

[Eden · Rating 3 out of 5]

2020 bk 178. I wanted to like this more than I did. I have quite a collection of women's personal accounts of life in England during WWII, including other epistolary styles. Eileen was young, but not as young as some others. I think what sets this apart is that she was from the next to top economic level Jewish families in Europe. Her father was a lawyer, her mother an Italian from a large Jewish Italian family. As a lawyer, her father knew and worked with people high in government and business and was not hesitant about using that influence. It was not the custom for a young woman - even one with a college degree - to move out of the family home. This was at the heart of the problem with Eileen's relationships with her parents - and the heart of the lack of information on daily life that I missed keenly. She talks of eating, sometimes kosher - but provides no knowledge of how they managed ration coupons to eat a strict diet. She talks casually of buying clothes, whenever she needed them, again with no reference to the hardships felt by most. There are times when I think WWII had only 2 impacts on her life - getting bus transportation to her job and keeping her boyfriend from her.

[Alan Zimmerman · Rating 3 out of 5]

An unusual book. These are love letters from London, from Eileen Alexander to her boyfriend Gershon during the long years of the war. She makes some interesting observations but much of this book is very personal and without deep context may be meaningless to readers. The lack of his responding letters also adds to the confusion.

[Pam Ritchie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Love in the Blitz; A Woman in a World Turned Upside Down by Eileen Alexander is a compilation of letters that Eileen Alexander sent to the man that she loves. They start in 1939 and go throughout World War 2, whilst Gershon is drafted, and sent off to war.

They are entertaining letters, and show a time when Eileen is ready to be her own person.  She writes about how difficult she finds the separation from Gershon, how her parents control her actions, how she finds her work, about her friends, and the about living through the war.

I found this to be well written, sometimes hard to read, interesting, and really insightful.  

Love in the Blitz was published on 30th April 2020, and is available from Amazon, Waterstones and Bookshop.org.

I was given this book in exchange for an unbiased review, and so my thanks to NetGalley and to William Collins.

[Donna · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have always loved epistolary books and this one was so interesting. It is a book of the collected letters of Eileen Alexander to her friend/fiance/husband Gershon Ellenbogen during WWII. They show the love, longing, friendship,family, community during this time. Like real life, sometimes there is anger, sadness, gossip, boredom. By the end of the book, I felt like we were friends and I was sorry to say good-bye.

The letters were found in a lot auctioned off and have been organized by the editors. There are passages written telling what was happening during the war when the letters were written. Letters from Gershon to Eileen have been lost, so we don't know how he responded to Eileen, but we get a bit of his love for her in Eileen's responses.

Excellent historic reading. I learned so much about Jews living in Britain and how they saw the Nazi atrocities, thoughts on Zionism, and what the world would be like after the war. So thankful someone found these letters and shared them with the world!!

[Ruth · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really wanted to like this a lot more than I did, and it had some really lovely, charming moments. But it was much too long, needed a great deal more editing, and suffered at times from a lack of explanation.
It's difficult since we only see one side of the correspondence - I didn't much like Gershon at the start of the book, and it felt like Eileen was far too desperate for his love. But by the end I felt much sorrier for him, and for the unstoppable fawning of Eileen. I'm afraid I found Eileen a bit too much, and whilst I understood her feelings, her endless love for him and her pain at their separation during the war, she did go on just a little bit, and there were lots of times I didn't really like her.

But there are aspects of wartime life that the letters capture like no novel ever could, and I was interested in her working life, and the snippets of information about eating out, travelling around London, being on fire duty, were all fascinating.

[Alannah Clarke · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thank you to netgalley.co.uk for giving me a free copy of this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.

I don't think I will ever tire of stories based in and around the second world war and this book was no exception. I have never read a book set out like a diary and that is what really piqued my interest in this novel. I have studied bits and pieces of what went on at the battlefield and the political aspects, I became interested in how women lived at the home front and how life went on.
As I read on, I did find some issues with the writing that could probably be fine with a good bit of editing. While I was reading some of the diary entries/letters, I found them to be far too long and lost interest in them. I thought this book showed a lot of promise but I found myself rushing through a bit of the book.

[Irene · Rating 3 out of 5]

After reading a small sample of these letters in a magazine I was delighted to receive a copy of the rest of them. With the benefit of hindsight I wish I had just left it with the much shorter excerpt. There was so much that was tedious, the endless “darlings”, the lack of explanations if she mentioned something the reader wouldn’t have known about. It would have been much more interesting with less letters and more information - in other words someone to give it a really good edit. It doesn’t help that Gershon’s replies are missing sadly, Eileen was a product of her time and class and didn’t seem too concerned about anything but Gershon. A bit of a flibberty gibbet when it came to the work she would do. There were some very interesting moments when she wasn’t sat writing letters! I was given this ARC by the publisher and Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

[Amy DeWolfe · Rating 2 out of 5]

Love in the Blitz is a collection of letters from Eileen Alexander, a clever, upper class young woman, to her boyfriend - then fiancé - during the war.

Honestly, it really doesn’t seem like Eileen’s usual lifestyle was touched by the war. Her family definitely didn’t struggle like many did and their lofty connections seemed to help them through a lot.

At first, I really liked Eileen - I found her funny and smart. But as her letters went on, the book started to drag. There was a lot of name dropping and she was definitely very privileged. As she falls in love with Gershon (they were friends first), her letters were full of ‘darlings’ and high dramatics.

Unfortunately, I struggled to get to the end. It would have been interesting to see how Gershon was responding to her letters (which she wrote to him almost every second day).

[I M · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm a historian - from that perspective these letters are a remarkable testament of what it's like to really live through war (as a privileged, educated woman). bombings and the everyday aspects of war are entertwined with family drama and love. You could draw from this for a great BBC drama.

Reading reviews, it seems some people have misunderstood what this book is. These are a collection of letters never intended for third party audience - which means that yes, the "narration" is not necessarily quick or plot motivated.

[Verity W · Rating 2 out of 5]

*****copy from NetGalley in return for an honest review ******

People who I like a lot have really enjoyed this. But I really struggled. I found Eileen’s style hard going and I didn’t actually like her much. But as a look at what it was like in a corner of England during the Second World War it is an insightful document - particularly as Eileen and her family are Jewish and have a lot of connections abroad

[Katherine Matychak · Rating 2 out of 5]

Made it to page 133. Wanted to push through because I generally enjoy learning more about everyday life in WWII, especially in Britain, but Eileen was too emotionally needy, spoiled, self-centered and tiresome. Apparently humblebrag was a thing even back then.

[Jennifer · Rating 1 out of 5]

Unfortunately I could get past the first 100 pages. The one sided letters filled with brief references to people that I don't know or care about did not hold my attention. Though I wanted to like this book u quickly lost interest.

[Marilyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have finished reading "Love in the Blitz" by Eileen Alexander. It is a selection of letter from Miss Alexander in London and the University of Cambridge to her future husband Gershon Ellenbogen while he is doing his military stuff in the RAF and in Cairo. A man bought the letters on E-Bay and he said in the introduction that they run to several volumes. Eileen must have written more than once a day, with "darling" and "dearest" in every second sentence. She must've been at least 8 years older than her baby brother - who would make living with Stewie on "Family Guy" a paradise. This boy threw chairs against the walls almost every month and was a real pain to his brother and sister when he was home from his boarding school. The middle child, Lionel, was more no saint, but at the normal irritation level of a younger sibling. He liked plane spotting, which he must have had a lot of practice at during the war, and he coached his friend to win the Shakespeare prize at Harrow, because it was his friend's last year while he, Lionel, had another year and thus another chance to win it. I thought that was good of him, since his parents had wanted him to win all the three Harrow School prizes a.s.a.p., and he had won the other two. (He did win the Shakespeare prize in his last year.)

I think that the editor should have kept more such material as Eileen's family, friends and work experiences in the book and edited out much of what he did keep - her feelings of loneliness for Gershon and of unworthiness for him. Of course they matter greatly, but there was too much of them that they dominated the book. What made the book interesting were quarrels with her parents about sleeping in her bed instead of in their Anderson shelter during air-raids (Eight people in the shelter was stifling and snore-filled.), overhearing conversations on the bus and the Tube, arriving one morning at her workplace to find it had been destroyed by bombing and fire, Mum and daughter buying sheets for her marriage bed before they "went on the ration", dealing with her friend Joan going out with men, while her friend's fiance was overseas and while her own fiance was overseas too. Worrying that Gershon would "grow wild oats" while she loved him too much to consider growing her own (and wishing that she had grown lots with him). Dealing with one of her bosses in the Ministry of Information who was randy in thought rather than in deed, who kept telling her about his fantasies over the other women in the department. Living with her parents, her aunt who would visit for a weekend and stay for six months, her brothers when they were home, their live-in help and a refugee woman from Eastern Europe of more than middle age. Eileen must have written more of such stuff in order to fill volumes and boxes of letters - even air-mail letters that have such limited space. BTW, I think a lot of Gershon's love for her that he kept them till he died in 2003.

It's not Eileen's fault that what I wanted from them wasn't the focus of the book. She meant them for Gershon, not me. But I think that she would rather have allowed me to read about her experiences than about her loneliness and lovesickness When Gershon was stationed in Cairo for 17 months, no wonder she felt drained or tied in knots; but frankly I got that insight in a few pages, not in more than fifty. I felt for her very much; but I wanted to know why Joan would rather marry a thorough blackguard and liar than the fiance she had been happy with before he went overseas

[Peter Maxwell · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a collection of the hundreds of love letters Eileen Alexander sent to her University friend, then fiance and then husband, Gershon Ellenbogen between 1939 and 1947. They provide not only a commentary on their relationship but also a valuable insight of aspects of social history at the time.
Eileen was obviously very bright and one of the few women at the time who obtained a 1st Class Honours degree in English at Cambridge. Destined for a brilliant academic career but for the intervention of WW2, we see a mixture of forthright convictions mixed with naivety and innocence.. Committed to the sanctity of marriage and premarital chastity she found it hard to understand (or condone) the behaviour of some friends and former University colleagues who displayed frailty in such areas whilst their partners were away.
She came from a relatively wealthy and well connected Jewish family but relations with her parents throughout the period were at times brittle. Eileen, ever independent minded, did not take kindly to some their interventions and comments about her life. She was accepted for the most junior of posts as an Administrate Assistant, in the Civil Service. What a scandalously waste of talent. Couldn't the Civil Service bureaucracy recognise her abilities and properly ignore her gender? She and father were not backward in approaching friends in high places endeavouring to use their influence to secure a posting to a Department of her choice or about the delay in Gershon securing a Commission, (after all, the partners of a lot of her friends seemed to have got one quite easily.!) Their approaches were not always successful.
Her War, although in London seemed relatively quiet. She did not like air raids but was resistant to going into a bunker whenever possible. Fire watch did show her some of the destruction inflicted on others but equally the letters revealed how frequently she lunched with friends in Hotels or quality restaurants or attended dinners with her family or acquaintances.. Despite all of this, Eileen reflected a keen interest in social justice and was appalled when in 1944 the Government did not implement the Beveridge Report. Perhaps surprisingly she expressed the view towards the end of the War that it might good for the people of the Country if Attlee became Prime Minister. (He did and she/we got the National Health Service in 1948.)

This book is well worth reading for the commentary on the times and for the way her life developed. A formidable woman who one could imagine, if she had lived in present times, might well have made a very significant contribution for the benefit of Society.

Recommended

[Sally · Rating 5 out of 5]

With thanks to #Netgalley, #4thestatebooks and ~wmcollinsbooks for a pre-publication copy.
Love in the Blitz
‘It’s natural for me to express myself in letters. Almost it’s my metier,..’ writes Eileen Alexander to her ‘solace’ Gershon Ellenbogen and, as these letters reveal, it is absolutely her ‘metier’. In another letter Eileen talks about about ‘the Art of letter writing’ with Mr Goodman who commented 'that the test of a good letter was that it should be interesting to a reader who knew neither the writer nor the recipient’.. Eileen’s letters certainly pass that test. I think that there is probably an art to reading letters too. Although at one point Eileen’s brother comments that ‘one would think you were writing for future publication’, these letters were written for one person only, Gershon. Any reader of this collection is a privileged audience. Necessarily some letters are more interesting than others, written with different moods and energies.They are both a record of a deep and enduring love and a social history of one of Britain’s bleakest times. The letters provide Incredible detail of the minutia of daily life - for example about meals eaten, nights out. about clothing, - ‘pinkish-mauve silk dress with white sprigs on it and a black straw hat with yards of veiling,’- and wartime adjustments - ‘instead of icing, they had a cake-cover decorated with white flowers’. The letters record lives lived through wartime as deadly bombs drop relentlessly around them. Eileen’s letters are deeply honest, intimate, she discusses her anticipation of a physical relationship with Gershon, how she has been reading books on ‘wantonness’ and thinking about what contraception they might use. Reading these letters at the time of coronavirus provided many parallels - enduring dark times with no prospect of an end, facing a powerful enemy and dreaming of good times when it’s all over - Eileen will ‘have my hair set twice a day and go abroad and sit in the sun in the most expensive bathing suit I can find...’The commentary threaded through the letters is timely and sensitively done providing additional context when needed. These letters are an incredible read on so many levels and provide such an intimate record of a young woman living at this time. As letter writing is a dying art and social history will be recorded in other media this is a reminder of a powerful form of human communication.

[Kayleigh Hills · Rating 3 out of 5]

This collection of letters, written by Eileen to her love Gershon, covers the early years of their relationship: from the beginning of their courtship, through to their engagement, marriage and the birth of their first child. This period of time also happens to coincide with the outbreak of WW2; their circumstances and respective roles in the war effort dictate their separation and their relationship lives through the words that they exchange.

Eileen is an intelligent woman and utterly (almost smugly?) committed to Gershon and the life that they plan to build together. She is a woman of societal privilege and swings between having progressive and feminist outlooks (on matters of education and employment) to being incredibly subservient within the relationship she is establishing with Gershon (describing herself to him as “I’m only a rather negligible little cluck after all“ and giving him permission to sow his “wild oats” if he can’t manage his physical impulses during their separation)

I really liked that the letters were given a contextual pre-face during various points; it helped me to gain an understanding of what was shaping Eileen’s life at the point of her putting to paper.

However, this book is in need of a heavy edit: the office gossip, never ending “darlings”, recollections of multiple dinners/lunches across society, the constant description of herself as “clucking” and general “he said/she said” narrative doesn’t contribute towards an understanding of their relationship, the war effort or enriching the contextual detail of the time.

This was a slow read, but I think if it is approached as a piece of historical writing rather than a love story, it might be more enjoyable. Moreover, as it is a one-sided collection of letters, it is only Eileen’s perspective of their relationship at best; it would’ve been interesting to read Gershon’s thoughts in his responses.

I did enjoy this particular nugget of wisdom though: “Marriage is a crazy business ... you give away one half of your food so as to get the other half cooked”

Thank you to NetGalley and William Morris for the opportunity to review this book in advance of its release.

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book came so highly recommended by a respected friend that I bought the hardback and audible versions, and am glad I did. I was particularly enthusiastic because I like the general topic (WWII and it's effects on the lives of the people of the times), coming-of-age stories, and epistolary narrative structures.

While there's no back and forth correspondence (Gershon's letters to Eileen were lost), Eileen's amazing writing, voice, and her detailed accounts of her personal, inner experience and her experiences with her parents as a rebellious daughter of a wealthy family, as a Cambridge student "reading English," as a civil servant are engaging and brilliant, and as an insecure, naive young woman navigating friendship and love in her first and only romantic encounter. I loved her clever use of her "idiom" and creative use of vocabulary, especially "solace" and "mollucking" (seems to be about anything from kissing and cuddling up to more exploratory activity).

I am glad to have listened; I kept the book to mark passages that particularly caught my attention. However, Eileen certainly could be trying. She is painfully insecure in her appearance and her suitability as a solace for Gershon; worried desperately about mollucking and sex; terribly spoiled yet nearly constantly annoyed by her parents, particularly her "Pa." I'm not sure I would have persisted turning pages, even though I realized that she was consciously and deliberately sharing all of her thoughts and feelings so Gershon would know all of her, good and bad (she says as much). He was stationed in Egypt during most of their friendship and engagement.

For me, an English major in a world where letter writing is a lost art, and we write to each other in badly punctuated textish, Love in the Blitz is an intimate look at a brilliant, literate, consummate letter-writer at a time when letters were a primary means of communication.

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Love in the Blitz provides a unique insight into life during the WWII London blitz and beyond. Eileen is a whip smart girl who writes copious letters to her friend/beau/husband during the course of this book. As much as I enjoyed this view into a lost world, I would be very happy never to read again the words 'darling', 'solace', and 'sorrow'. These terms are used endlessly in her missives - clearly the lingo of the time - and possibly more palatable to Gershon who would have read them once every few days rather than in a few sittings, as I did. Beyond that little bother I found the book great fun and a well timed to read during lockdown, another time of personal struggle.

What would Eileen think of her letters being published in a book? Once she overcame the excitement I think she might be embarrassed to have her private thoughts and gossip spread so liberally about for all to see. I would be mortified to have my love letters to my husband available for public consumption. Sweet as her love musings are, they do get a bit soppy, as I suspect we all have done... if we can remember back that far to early love in our courtship.

There is much intelligent thought happening in Eileen's head to offset the occasional silliness. She was a very bright and perceptive young woman. I would absolutely love to see Gershon's replies. A pity Eileen didn't treasure his utterances as much as he did hers. Neigh on 1400 letters in total! My, Eileen, you do have much to say.

Love in the Blitz is fun, entertaining, enlightening and full of sweet love tokens to bring delight to your day. Just what we need to lighten the weight of lockdown.