Salonika Burning

by Gail Jones

Greece, 1917. The great city of Salonika is engulfed by fire as all of Europe is ravaged by war.

Amid the destruction, there are those who have come to the frontlines to heal: surgeons, ambulance drivers, nurses, orderlies and other volunteers. Four of these people—Stella, Olive, Grace and Stanley—are at the centre of Gail Jones’s extraordinary new novel, which takes its inspiration from the wartime experiences of Australians Miles Franklin and Olive King, and British painters Grace Pailthorpe and Stanley Spencer. In Jones’s imagination these four lives intertwine and ramify, compelled by the desire to create something meaningful in the ruins of a broken world.

Immersive and gripping, Salonika Burning illuminates not only the devastation of war but also the vast social upheaval of the times. It shows Gail Jones to be at the height of her powers.

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Historical, War, Australia, Greece, Audiobook

256 pages, Hardcover

Published November 1, 2022

About the author

Gail Jones is the author of two short-story collections, a critical monograph, and the novels BLACK MIRROR, SIXTY LIGHTS, DREAMS OF SPEAKING, SORRY and FIVE BELLS.

Three times shortlisted for the Miles Franklin Award, her prizes include the WA Premier's Award for Fiction, the Nita B. Kibble Award, the Steele Rudd Award, the Age Book of the Year Award, the Adelaide Festival Award for Fiction and the ASAL Gold Medal. She has also been shortlisted for international awards, including the IMPAC and the Prix Femina.

Her fiction has been translated into nine languages. Gail has recently taken up a Professorship at UWS.

Reviews

[Text Publishing]

The following book reviews have been shared by Text Publishing – publisher of Salonika Burning

‘Fans of Jones’s gift with words will appreciate this moving, poetic and meditative tribute to war, suffering, fortitude and the human spirit. It is worth reading, not least to uncover enchanting examples of the inspired way Jones uses descriptive language, many of which will resonate long after the final page.’
Books + Publishing

‘Elegant and intensely ruminative…Jones’s language in Salonika Burning is at once muscular and delicate, her narrative precise yet impressionistic…Jones has written some fine novels…but none finer than Salonika Burning.’
Diane Stubbings, Australian Book Review

‘Gail Jones once again showcases her talent for writing memorable characters and poignant storylines…The mettle and fortitude of these characters burn brighter than any fire, bringing to light the selfless acts of those who toil behind the scenes, for they are the backbone of success and perseverance in the face of chaos.’
Aurelia Orr, Readings

‘Gail Jones has to be one of Australia’s most consistently impressive writers. Her prose is evocative, her plots meaningful and her characters drawn with considerable care…[Salonika Burning] is just as reliably lush, moving and literary as everything else she’s written.’
Stephanie Convery, Guardian

‘A superbly written tale about the fragility of existence and the realities of war…The circular, impressionistic structure of this book enhances the narrative and will hook keen readers…Truly unique.’
Nanci Nott, ArtsHub

‘Extraordinary writing…Striking images of both the beauty and horror of a burned city.’
Kate Evans, ABC RN Bookshelf

‘Vivid…very fine observation…Gail Jones has a sense of the numinal, the world beyond what can be described.’
Tom Wright, ABC RN Bookshelf

‘A novel by Gail Jones is always a cause for celebration…Beautifully immersive writing.’
BookPeople

‘Enthralling…[Jones] is one of Australia’s most distinguished and highly awarded writers…The writing is exquisitely balanced and tender, coloured by sadness, dread and a touch of tragic irony.’
Carmel Bird, Saturday Paper

‘Jones writes about gender and trauma with her trademark gentle touch…Profound.’
Bec Kavanagh, Guardian

‘This novel is nuanced and complex, beautifully written, and gently savage as it navigates grief, memory, a burning city and a collection of war workers whose jobs were care and solace rather than killing.’
Kate Evans, ABC Arts

‘Gail Jones once again showcases her talent for writing memorable characters and poignant storylines…Lyrical and reflective…The language is just exquisite throughout and Jones’s ability to reveal devastating truths and describe horrific scenes in beautiful language is both disarming and comforting. She is a talented author and her fans will not be disappointed.’
Good Reading

‘Powerful and superbly written…Grounded in historical fact rendered vivid and immediate through Jones’s fictionalised plot and exquisite prose.’
West Australian

‘A visceral account that connects Greece and Australia through the atrocities of war…The author’s words dig deep, her intimate and direct descriptions take the reader on a journey…[Jones] brings together historical events with fiction, through captivating prose and a plot that evokes one image after the other.’
Neos Cosmos

‘In her exquisite ninth novel, Gail Jones demonstrates, once again, why she is widely regarded as one of Australia’s finest novelists working today.’
West Australian

‘For decades, Gail Jones has been writing with more intelligence, verve and sensuous delight in the world than most of her peers…[A] meditation—couched in prose at once lavish and rigorously controlled—on the ways in which conflict can unmake the world and leave us scattered and cruelly isolated from one another.’
Geordie Williamson, Saturday Paper

‘Salonika Burning continues Jones’ narrative searching for what rises up from engulfing loss and also the troubling, necessary role of art as imaginative witness…Extraordinary.’
Conversation

‘Elegantly written and precisely structured.’
Age/SMH

‘An intoxicating flight of fancy.’
Australian Women’s Weekly

‘[Gail Jones] captures the reader instantly with her rhapsodical perspective of fire…[Salonika Burning] is lyrically intense, original and savagely evocative.’
Samela Harris, SA Weekend

‘Gail Jones breathes new life into the traditional narrative of war.’
Danielle Raffaele, RTRFM Bunch of Books

[Tundra · Rating 5 out of 5]

This has a very simple plot but the way Jones writes these characters and captures this moment in time is mesmerising. You feel like you are on a precipice with them as they wonder when and what life will be like after the war and how they have come to be in this place.

[Amy Heap · Rating 3 out of 5]

Loosely based on the experiences of four actual people, including Miles Franklin, this is a lyrical, dreamlike visit to Salonika as it burned in WWI. I don’t think it helped that I was reading four books at once, during a very busy time of year. I struggled until near the end to distinguish between the three female characters, and found the story hard to grasp, which fitted with the presence of malaria, but was nonetheless disappointing. I did catch glimpses of other WWI books I have loved, like Pat Barker’s Regeneration Trilogy, and I really enjoyed the ending.

[Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

An adeptly written historical novel. I knew next to nothing about Miles Franklin's WW1 activities and nothing about what was happening in Macedonia and Greece at the time and had never heard of Salonika. I knew a little about people suffering from malaria in Italy so I wasn't surprised that was happening during WW1 in countries on the Mediterranean coast.
Gail Jones has made fictional some of the circumstances of the characters, such as Stella's mother's death while she was still a child (Miles Franklin's mother lived into old age) and that threw me a bit for a time, I wanted a re-enactment of what really might have gone through MF's mind during her time with the Scottish Women's Hospitals for Foreign Service.
All in all, the discombobulation of the characters during a stoic wartime service felt authentic.
Another accomplished novel by one of my favourite writers. One I'd like to read again.

[Leanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

An insight into a short period in the Great War and the people caught in war. This mix of history and fiction is set in 1917 at the same time as the great fire of Salonika, feels like a simple story of 4 people working to save lives in the war, yet their experiences feel enormous and it is written so clearly. War sounds truly horrible yet people do truly amazing feats of care and compassion in the midst of such horror.

[Bec · Rating 4 out of 5]

"A bookish daughter was a scandal in farming circles"

"Again, she felt a suffocation. The pain of his death lodged in her chest and her lungs were brackets around a void"

I've never read about the Eastern Front, nor did I realise the Stella Prize and Miles Franklin were named for the same author

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

The novel follows four characters for a brief time on the eastern front - Greece - during WWI. They are based loosely on the experiences of Australians Stella Miles Franklin and Olive King, and British painters Grace Pailthorpe and Stanley Spencer. The story zig zags between their intersecting lives around the time of the great fire of Salonika, which was accidental and not caused by the war. At times each character are responding to the same experiences in slightly different ways at slightly different times. And occasionally briefly meeting. Olive bought a truck and refitted it to be a serviceable ambulance, driving wounded from the front to the field hospital. Stella works as an orderly and in the kitchen. Grace is a doctor. And Stanley works with the donkeys, who are also employed to carry wounded from the front to hospital on travois'. The real story is their emotional upheavals, having to keep much of the trauma inside to function day to day, suppressing their feelings of grief and horror. Despite the author saying this is not strictly a history, I leaned much about WWI, as I would look up details about the fire and some of the battles. A very interesting read and I look forward to Ms Jones' appearance at the Writers Week in March as part of the Adelaide Festival of the Arts.

[Anne Fenn · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was a bit halfhearted about reading this novel, but I’m very glad I got started. It’s a superb imaginative recreation of life in 1917 Salonica and surrounds, during World War One. Four main characters bring different aspects to life. Two from Great Britain are involved with the Scottish Women’s Hospital, nursing or ambulance driving. An Australian VAD at the hospital and an English Tommie from nearby armed forces complete the cast.

[Robert Watson · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very satisfying imagining of Salonika during the devastating fire there in WW1. A cast of four main characters including interestingly a fictional version of Stella Miles Franklin. The character's responses to the horror unfolding around them and their memories of life before the war makes up the bulk of the story. Eminently believable and ultimately heartbreaking.

[Jillian · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was drawn to read it because my maternal grandfather was posted to Salonika with the Royal Fusiliers from December 1915- May 1917. The fire that consumed much of the city and around which the book is set, occurred in August 1917, but the conditions would have been similar during his time there. Indeed, the arrival of the Zeppelin that forms part of Jones' narrative, occurred while he was posted there.

It is a brave writer who melds the lives of documented historical figures into a fictional narrative - especially when those lives are within living memory. Gail Jones has done a superb job. Her touch is light and empathetic. By focusing on a small group, two Australian women, a British woman and a slightly antisocial man, bringing them into contact with each other, she is able to convey complex, layered and contradictory views and responses. She brings to life the hell of war, its futility, contradictions, pain and waste - and the intellectual, moral and emotional turmoil it creates for the individuals involved. Because her novel has drawn on records of a small number of those present during the conflict, in the hands of a skilled writer, it can delve deep into the impact of events on behaviours and psyches.

And Gail Jones is that skilled writer. I have studied WWI, taught about it, and treasure my grandfather's postcards and mementos. The perspectives of this group of committed, well-meaning volunteers mopping up some of the damage provides another equally horrific perspective. . It's vivid, powerful, sad, and lingering.

[Helena Scutt · Rating 3 out of 5]

I felt like the chapters were so short we didn't really get to know any of the characters well and the ending didn't seem to have a build up, it just happened and then the story finishes. It's interesting to hear about the Eastern front and there were plenty of mentions of Salonika and you did feel like there was a ghost of the city that used to exist but I didn't really connect with anyone or anything in the story unfortunately

[Betty · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jones has beautiful prose and a spare, lucid style of writing. The novel is really 4 stories, set in Macedonia in the first world war. The characters of each story don't really interact, and so the novel is like four snapshots of a historical time.

[Lyn Elliott · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can’t honestly say that I enjoyed reading Salonika Burning very much, but it made me think about authorial intent more than any other novel I’ve read for a long time.

I realised that I just didn't know enough about Gail Jones to be able to hazard a guess, so I set out to learn a bit, with a prompt from Hilary Mantel who, in her introduction to her Mantel Pieces: Royal Bodies and Other Writing from the London Review of Books collection of book reviews, about her need to understand context, which requires background reading and time to learn. She also remarks that ‘Most imaginative writers are a party of one’.

I don't know enough about Gail Jones’ thinking or writing to be able to place this book, and I suspect that Mantel’s description of writers as a party of one fits Jones too.

I wondered what ideas drove her, why she chose to set a book in a suffragette-run field hospital near Salonika in 1917, as the horror of the Great War spread there from western Europe. I wondered why she chose the four main characters, all inspired by real people, whose thoughts and experiences take turns in the foreground of the narrative.

Mantel also wrote in her collection of essays that a novel is a vehicle for ideas. Not all novels aim for more than telling a good story, but Jones clearly does. Reflecting on what I’d read, I could see that Jones is concerned with the trauma of war; the essential aloneness of individuals, even when they’re working closely together as what could be thought of as a team; and what reviewer Tanya Dalziel describes as ‘searching for what rises up from engulfing loss and also the troubling, necessary role of art as imaginative witness’.

If I hadn’t heard her speak at the Adelaide Writers week, I would have had no idea that one of her main concerns is the ethics of aestheticizing war, as catastrophe becomes detached from emotion.

At this point I think it’s fair to say that Jones is an academic as well as a novelist and that she approached the writing of this book with a degree of intellectual abstraction I hadn’t anticipated.
Some notes from her talk:
- The aesthetic of art allows and creates a sense of distance for both the artist and the viewer/reader which creates ethical discomfort.
- We have a responsibility as adults to perceive ethical dissonance and respond to it, as in the case with the aesthetics of war.
- How do artists observe catastrophe (the burning of Salonika; exhausted, wounded and dead soldiers)? What moral choices do people make?

Three of her four characters were or later became artists, all four were volunteering in the Salonika region at the time, but there is no evidence that any of them met: English artist Stanley Spencer; English doctor and later surrealist artist Grace Pailthorpe; Australian writer Stella Miles Franklin and Australian adventurer and remarkable woman Olive Kelso King.

None of the four was famous at the time and what distinguishes them for Jones is that each has a very particular and conscious way of observing and reacting, which she in turn observes with a distanced eye.

She deliberately began the book with a far view of the city of Salonika burning, and then moved to the interior lives of her characters, alternating chapters between them in overlapping loops to multiply and diversify the point of view, allowing paradoxes of time as the story circles around the characters. On the matter of time, Jones referred to a review by Tanya Dalziell: https://theconversation.com/time-is-a...

Although Jones tells the story through her characters, the tone is distant, as if observed remotely. It was only after hearing Jones speak about her book that I felt I could begin to understand what she really wanted to convey but I am still puzzling.

There will be podcasts for many of the sessions from Writers Week and I do hope that her second session, which I couldn't attend, is broadcast as she said in answer to my question that she would talk about the historical background and characters more in that session.

On the strength of all this, I’ve given it four stars – 3 for the reading experience itself but definitely worth another star to learn more about the ideas she works with.

More reviews
https://thewest.com.au/entertainment/... Gemma Nisbett review

https://www.theguardian.com/books/202...

SMH review https://www.smh.com.au/culture/books/... As with Jones’ previous novel, The Death of Noah Glass, this new one is strongly character-driven, with the reader given access to the characters’ inner lives and thoughts as they try to process their experiences and make sense of their situation, wrangling with the truth of a poem by David Malouf that Jones quotes as an epigraph: “The world is alive and dangerous.”

Diane Stubbings reviews 'Salonika Burning' by Gail Jones
https://www.australianbookreview.com.au › current-issue

The Great Fire of Salonika, as it came to be known, is the starting point for Gail Jones's elegant and intensely ruminative new novel, Salonika Burning.

https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/c...
Review by Carmel Bird
Salonika Burning, the ninth novel from Gail Jones, is an enthralling narrative that transports readers to the battlefields of Greece in 1917. Jones, whose book The Death of Noah Glass won the Prime Minister’s Literary Award for Fiction in 2019, is one of Australia’s most distinguished and highly awarded writers. This latest novel, like much of her work, brings the settings and dramas of the past into sharp and vivid focus.
The novel’s structure has a delicate rhythm, as each character in turn is recurrently foregrounded.
The lives, thoughts and feelings of the characters, singly and in concert, enunciate with clarity and elegance the horror endured by individuals trapped in the chaos of war, which is here backlit by the unrelated conflagration in Salonika.
The author’s note explains that, although the characters were inspired by historical figures, these richly detailed stories are largely imagined. There is evidence of extensive research: I could not resist checking on the biographies of Olive King, Miles (Stella) Franklin, Grace Pailthorpe and Stanley Spencer.
https://www.textpublishing.com.au/boo...
https://anzlitlovers.com/2022/11/23/s...

[George Couvalis · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found this book odd. While the main characters are well drawn, the people of Salonica are just background. No attempt is made to work through their inner life. So, while its well written in some ways, I think its defective in other ways. It felt as if Salonica was just a background, and there could have been any background in wartime. There's no interest, except indirectly in the people in the city. Contrast this with Mark Mazower's Salonica, city of ghosts. While that's a work of history, it pulses with the life of the real people in the city at various times. Why is Jones only really interested in the Australian and British characters?

[Carolyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is another thoughtful and challenging novel by Gail Jones. I have always found her to be an intellectual writer and in this book she combines big ideas about humanity's cruelty in war with an awareness of how horror can also fascinate us. She also shows how we use different strategies to distance ourselves from traumatic experiences.

She begins the novel with a description of soldiers watching from afar the great fire of Salonika of 1917. The fire was not caused by the hostilities of the Macedonian front (where the Allied powers were fighting against the Bulgarians - allies of the Austro-Hungarians) but started by a kitchen fire. It's a dramatic opening where Jones sets a scene of destruction watched from a distance.

She then moves her focus to a field hospital established by the Scottish Women's Hospital. I was very interested to learn that the home hospital in Scotland was established by the suffragists and employed only women. In the hospital we are not distanced from the horrors of war but see them close up as the wounded and dying are brought in.

Jones chooses four real life people as her main characters: Grace Pailthorpe (a surgeon), Stella Miles Franklin who was working in the hospital as a kitchen hand, Olive King, an Australian woman whose wealthy father had bought her an ambulance which she was driving on the Macedonian front and Stanley Spencer, a medical orderly (who later became one of Britain's most celebrated painters). These people were not necessarily all in Salonika at the same time nor did they necessarily know each other. Jones uses artistic licence to weave their stories together. It is another example of the increasingly common combination of historical facts and artistic imagination to create fictional worlds that not only tell a story but pursue significant themes.

At times I found that the stories of each character took rather too long to return to and there was a lull in the third quarter of the novel. However, the discovery of a German airman, downed when a Zeppelin crashes, brings all the characters together in a dramatic finale.

We are discussing this novel in our online book group next week. There are so many aspects to this novel to stimulate discussion and I'm sure I will be even more appreciative of its strengths and complexity by sharing my views with others.

[Cass Moriarty · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gail Jones is one of Australia’s finest literary writers and her latest novel Salonika Burning (Text Publishing 2022) is another example of her masterful control of language and her beautiful prose.

Set in WWI, the four main characters navigate the (true) historical burning of the city of Salonika in Greece, and the aftermath of its destruction, all while in the midst of the carnage of the Great War. Each character is loosely modelled on an actual person, Australians Stella Miles Franklin and Olive King, and British painters Grace Pailthorpe and Stanley Spencer, but Jones has reimagined their lives and their connection to each other in this novel. As nurses, ambulance drivers, diggers and surgeons, the nuanced and compelling relationship dynamics between the four is enough even without the reference to them being inspired by real people.

The novel is a clear-eyed and raw depiction of the horrors of war, never overdone, authentic and believable, moving, unsettling and an absolute joy to read. The ending is unexpected and shocking.

For those who love a fast-moving plot, this may not be the novel for you. But for those readers who enjoy a deep immersion into characterisation and relationships, and the interiority of thought, this book will be immensely satisfying.

[Sally May · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really didn't engage with the writing style of this novel. It felt disjointed. I could not develop either sympathy or empathy for the characters, flawed and suffering as they were. For far too long there was no sense of how the stories of each would coalesce. Even the images of 1917 Salonika burning, which should have allowed for momentous description, seemed remote and isolated.
It seemed a series of frozen tableaux - random images and references made to things unrelated and never followed up. There were some clever, evocative images, but they seemed a little contrived...
Page 197 of 243 finally brings Stanley, Olive, Grace and Stella briefly together when a wounded German soldier is brought to one of the Scottish Women's Hospitals, a field hospital on the Eastern Front. But still it is tenuous, ephemeral, unresolved. I was left unclear as to the author's intent. It certainly illustrated both the horror and the mundanity of war, but failed to engage me as a reader.

[Book My Imagination · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a short book that packed a lot of sadness in.
However, it wasn't a book that made me cry. It just made me sad for the devastation, for the characters, and the loneliness of war.

It also took me a while to complete this one.
I found the writing quite hard to sink into, to connect with the characters, and to want to continue.
But this is not the first time I have felt this way for a book, so I know that I need to put it down for a bit, and only pick it up when the urge takes me.
Reading this book in this way really helped in the end to connect properly, and I am happy that I stuck with it.
The author has woven these 4 main characters into this book with their own stories, their thoughts, needs, and reasons for being involved.
Books like this are important as they tell a story in a unique way.
It's a book like no other I have read, and I still sometimes think about 1 character in particular.

[Alison Lloyd · Rating 5 out of 5]

'Salonika Burning' is set in an army base camp on WWI's eastern front, in the days immediately followng the burning of Salonika, now Thessalonika in Macedonia. It takes you into the lives of four characters - a doctor, an ambulance driver, a cook and an infantryman. They're loosely based on Australians Miles Franklin and Olive King, and British painters Grace Pailthorpe and Stanley Spencer. The novel is a far more convincing portrayal of war than most of the adventure/romances populating current historical fiction. If you liked Kristin Hannah's 'The Nightingale' you're NOT likely to enjoy 'Salonika Burning'. No victorious heroines defying nasty Nazis here. Instead the characters are struggling to cope with their disillusionment and the everyday miseries of life at the front. Not much happens for the first two-thirds of the book, although the lyrical prose, and the sense of heading somewhere profound kept me reading. The end fulfilled this promise, although it was heartbreaking.

[Judy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Alternating between the four main characters, these accounts seem almost to be pages taken from their diaries. This book tells not of those in face-to-face combat, but of those behind the lines dealing with the injuries and diseases of those soldiers. It also raises the conflict of having to treat an enemy soldier as human. The morose style of writing depicted the horrors of war well.

Greece, 1917. The great city of Salonika is engulfed by fire as all of Europe is ravaged by war. Amid the destruction, there are those who have come to the frontlines to heal: surgeons, ambulance drivers, nurses, orderlies and other volunteers. Four of these people—Stella, Olive, Grace and Stanley—are at the centre of Gail Jones’s extraordinary new novel, which takes its inspiration from the wartime experiences of Australians Miles Franklin and Olive King, and British painters Grace Pailthorpe and Stanley Spencer. In Jones’s imagination these four lives intertwine and ramify, compelled by the desire to create something meaningful in the ruins of a broken world. Immersive and gripping, Salonika Burning illuminates not only the devastation of war but also the vast social upheaval of the times. It shows Gail Jones to be at the height of her powers.

[George · Rating 3 out of 5]

A historical fiction novel set in Salonkia, Greece, in 1917. The novel following the lives of four fictionalized versions of real people who served behind the Balkan lines as volunteers. Their real life identities are Australians Stella Miles Franklin, an author, Olive King, a wealthy adventurer who bought her own ambulance, British psychology researcher Grace Pailthorpe and British painter Stanley Spencer. In real life, none of these people ever met. In the novel only their first names are given, to disassociate them from their postwar lives.

Each individual acts in a supportive capacity, working for the Scottish Women’s Hospital. All suffer from the effects of malaria whilst in Greece.

I have read a number of Gail Jones’s novels and prefer ‘Sorry’, ‘Dreams of Speaking’ (both shortlisted for the Miles Franklin Award), and ‘One Another’.

This book was first published in 2002.

[Jennie O'bryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book to begin the year. I love a book where I learn something and there was so much to learn here. The great fire of Salonika in 1917 was entirely separate to the war and yet a tremendous catastrophe in itself. The famous white tower which was originally red due to the torture and murders that occurred within was unknown to me. The four main characters were wonderfully presented and so deftly differentiated from each other with such a light hand - Stella so querulous in her fever, Olive the mix of posh but also practical Australian, lover of Germany in a time where to admit this was akin to treason, Grace (Based on the fascinating Grace Mailthorpe) and Stanley and the mules - most poignant of all. The removal of the mules voices in order to silence their night time braying will stay with me for a long time.

[Rikki Hill · Rating 3 out of 5]

#salonikaburning by #gailjones was a reasonably short book but had a lot going on. Set in 1917 in a war hospital in Greece, four different characters - who are based on real life people - cross paths. Despite its shorter length, the beautiful writing demanded more attention therefore taking more time, but where this book was most interesting was its time and place setting and the different side of world war one that we are transported to - not the Western Front, and not the trenches; not the experiences of soldiers, but of a doctor (a woman too, by the way), an ambulance driver, an orderly (Stella Miles Franklin by the way!) and a painter (the lone male of the four, who also works with the donkeys.) Now that I'm writing this mini review I think perhaps I enjoyed it more that I initially thought!

3.5 stars

[Rachel · Rating 2 out of 5]

Salonika Burning is set during WW2 when the town of Salonika, in what is now Greece, was impacted by a major fire (not directly as a result of the war). The story is told from the viewpoint of four people from the UK or Australia who are involved in the war - three work at a hospital and one is with the army.

I found this a struggle. The four characters are all very insular in their chapters. There is very little dialogue and I initially found the three female characters very hard to differentiate. The burning of Salonika is almost incidental to the story and the book doesn't really delve into much of the history.

The only saving grace is that it's really short. I might have considered giving up if it was any longer. 2.5 stars rounded down.

[Blair · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jones is a highly acclaimed writer and I've enjoyed some of her novels, but this one left me a bit cold. She uses real people as the basis for her four main characters, including the Australian writer Miles (Stella) Franklin, and sets the action after the accidental burning of the city of Salonika in 1917 as the characters are mostly with the Scottish Women's Hospital during the Eastern Front of WWI. None of them really come to life, though, and she alludes to Pat Barker's Regeneration trilogy at one point, which was an unfortunate reminder of a much better writer using historical figures as characters during WWI.

[Susan Wishart · Rating 4 out of 5]

A historically based novel set in a World War one Scottish field hospital near Salonika by this marvelous Australian writer. Loosely based on the lives and experiences of four characters; two of them British. Grace is a surgeon and Stanley a young aspiring artist. The two other characters are both Australian women, one the daughter of a wealthy banker and the other, Stella, is based on the famous Australian writer Miles Franklin.
Not a cheerful read by any means but a remarkable insight into the grinding work load and grim conditions faced by these wonderful volunteers amidst the sad chaos of a war zone and the lasting effect it had on their lives.

[Di · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is 1917 and the city of Salonika is engulfed by flames that destroy all in their path, churches, synagogues and mosques, department stores, hotels and houses. Amid the smoke, ruin and desolation we meet the four main characters, Olive the ambulance driver, Grace the surgeon, Stella and assistant cook and Stanley, a young artist and medical orderly. These characters are based on real life people: Australians Miles Franklin and Olive King, and British painters Grace Pailthorpe and Stanely Spencer.

Jones is a wonderful writer who imagines the entwining of these four lives as a way to show the devastation of the war and the social upheaval of the times.

[Edward · Rating 4 out of 5]

This novel takes place in 1917, during World War I in Salonika, Macedonia. The events take place after a great fire unrelated to the fighting. The author focuses on four characters - two from Australia and two from England. They are real people, but the author uses literary license as she wrote in her notes that there is no indication they know each or interacted with each other. This story was interesting and dealt with the horror of World War I. This is the second novel of this author I have read. She is an excellent writer from Australia.

[Anne Green · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Great Fire of Salonika which happened in 1917 during the First World War is the stepping off point for this intensely lyrical and elegantly written novel. Based on the lives of four real characters, the narrative interweaves and shifts between each of them, hinting at the dissociation they all feel and the intensely self-reflective states of mind that constitute their individual attempts to reconcile their place in the middle of a war where the point of everything, e.g. "populations of all sorts, humans and beasts", is so that men "could line up to slaughter each other".

[Lyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

After hearing Gail Jones talk about this book on Conversations on the ABC, I really wanted to read it. Knowing the background and what was based on history made this an immersive read. The imagining of each of the main characters responses to various situations was beautifully done. A bonus was that this situation in Salonika has been rarely covered in any of the historical books I have read. So I learned a lot, and enjoyed the various perspectives around a very different situation.