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Of Silence and Slow Time
In August 1914, in German-occupied France, 12 year old Amelie stumbles across an injured British soldier, Captain James Winter, in the woods. Throughout the first winter of the Great War her family keep him hidden from the enemy, until early in 1915 when James disappears. Seventeen years later, his son comes to the village to find out what happened to his father. Now the secrets of the past look certain to come out, although there are those intent on preventing them from doing so.
240 pages, Hardcover
First published May 1, 2004
About the author
Catherine Bruton
20 books55 followersI live just outside Bath with my husband, Jonny, and my two children (plus two toy monkeys, six goldfish and we’re hoping to get some chickens!). I teach English two days a week at a local secondary school. I also write articles for newspapers and magazines. Oh, and I write novels too!
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
August 3, 2022
With a title like that one might presuppose a certain shall we say, lethargic pacing…and one would be wrong. This, in fact, turned out to be quite a lovely story. Surprisingly so, because Endeavor Press doesn’t usually specialize in that, opting for more of the dated mystery thrillers.
This one, though, was a quiet (indeed) family drama, or more like a story of a French countryside family whose life gets interrupted and forever altered by a British soldier they find hiding out in the nearby woods.
Told through the perspective of the quietest by far member of the family, a mute by choice young girl at the beginning of the war and then later, in 1932, a young woman, someone used to observing, the story strategically plays the emotional strings like a violin but not in a cheaply manipulative way, more like in a quiet affecting way.
The narrative splits, the tragedy echoes into the present day, wounds scab over only for the son of the British soldier, then a boy and now a man, to come to the village to inquire about the past. War is a sort of echoing tragedy, after all. Especially in places where it had the sort of direct effect as WWI did in Europe.
All in all, a very solid emotional drama with strong writing, character and otherwise. Definitely not slow, in fact, this slender volume reads very quickly. Recommended for fans of historical fiction.
This one, though, was a quiet (indeed) family drama, or more like a story of a French countryside family whose life gets interrupted and forever altered by a British soldier they find hiding out in the nearby woods.
Told through the perspective of the quietest by far member of the family, a mute by choice young girl at the beginning of the war and then later, in 1932, a young woman, someone used to observing, the story strategically plays the emotional strings like a violin but not in a cheaply manipulative way, more like in a quiet affecting way.
The narrative splits, the tragedy echoes into the present day, wounds scab over only for the son of the British soldier, then a boy and now a man, to come to the village to inquire about the past. War is a sort of echoing tragedy, after all. Especially in places where it had the sort of direct effect as WWI did in Europe.
All in all, a very solid emotional drama with strong writing, character and otherwise. Definitely not slow, in fact, this slender volume reads very quickly. Recommended for fans of historical fiction.
July 11, 2018
Beautiful, gentle, moving tale shot through with powerful and appropriate imagery
This is a beautifully written novel which deserves a wider readership than it appears to have gained. The plot involves (unusually) two equally successful timelines, both of which are narrated in the first person by Amelie, as a child in 1914/15 and as a young woman in 1932. As we read through these two alternating narratives we gradually not only discover the fate of the young English soldier whom Amelie's family have been protecting, but also are reminded of just how far reaching in terms of effect, intensity and duration one's actions can be.
The power of Catherine Bruton's prose is especially noticeable in Amelie's visual and emotional descriptions, such as "The day is bright and the café is soaked with light that catches on the coloured bottles in the glass cabinet by which my sister stands, reflecting rainbow streaks upon her white skin, and in the wisps of her hair" and "the night air still, but for the bullet smoke and the cloudy white of my breathing, suddenly visible as I panted like fear". "Panted like fear" really helps to convey clearly to the reader the young Amelie's feelings and reactions.
Although, very occasionally, a word or phrase was repeated whithin a few pages, I generally found Catherine Bruton's facility with descriptive language put to good use by a character whose muteness gives her the opportunity for acute observation.
The author's understanding of human nature and its shortcomings is also clear from the characterisation - particularly of the twelve year old Amelie, who is simply too young to fully comprehend what is occurring around her.
So, after all this positive feedback, why am I withholding a star? There is only one reason - the ending is rushed, which is a shame after the gentle yet intriguing build-up. A very high 4.5 stars
This is a beautifully written novel which deserves a wider readership than it appears to have gained. The plot involves (unusually) two equally successful timelines, both of which are narrated in the first person by Amelie, as a child in 1914/15 and as a young woman in 1932. As we read through these two alternating narratives we gradually not only discover the fate of the young English soldier whom Amelie's family have been protecting, but also are reminded of just how far reaching in terms of effect, intensity and duration one's actions can be.
The power of Catherine Bruton's prose is especially noticeable in Amelie's visual and emotional descriptions, such as "The day is bright and the café is soaked with light that catches on the coloured bottles in the glass cabinet by which my sister stands, reflecting rainbow streaks upon her white skin, and in the wisps of her hair" and "the night air still, but for the bullet smoke and the cloudy white of my breathing, suddenly visible as I panted like fear". "Panted like fear" really helps to convey clearly to the reader the young Amelie's feelings and reactions.
Although, very occasionally, a word or phrase was repeated whithin a few pages, I generally found Catherine Bruton's facility with descriptive language put to good use by a character whose muteness gives her the opportunity for acute observation.
The author's understanding of human nature and its shortcomings is also clear from the characterisation - particularly of the twelve year old Amelie, who is simply too young to fully comprehend what is occurring around her.
So, after all this positive feedback, why am I withholding a star? There is only one reason - the ending is rushed, which is a shame after the gentle yet intriguing build-up. A very high 4.5 stars
July 10, 2024
This novel is different from most World War I historical fiction. Told by a young French girl who was 12 years old in 1914, this is a story of the repercussions of war in a small village occupied by the Germans close to the front lines. The prose is exquisite, not what one expects in a book set in World War I. This is a quick read, where historical facts take a backseat to the long-term emotional carnage of war. As I read, all I could think of was what a waste...millions of lives were destroyed because of a political assassination of someone most people had never heard of in a country they couldn't find on a map.
May 10, 2018
In the summer of 1914, in the early days of the Great War, a French family hide and care for a wounded British soldier, Captain James Winter.
As the months go by, the danger increases as the Germans warn that any British soldiers they find in hiding will be shot as spies and the people sheltering them will be punished too. Over the weeks, James develops very different relationships with the two sisters helping him.
Twelve-year-old Amelie doesn't speak. She's not deaf nor is she mute for physical reasons, she just stopped speaking when her mother died some years ago and hasn't uttered a word since. James teaches her to communicate through shapes traced on her palm and Amelie feels like he's given her a voice.
James' relationship with Amelie's older sister, Therese, is very different. The two of them fall in love and begin an affair.
The story is split over two time periods: the first few months of the war and 1932, when James' grown-up son comes looking for information about his father. Because of this framing device, we know from the beginning that something terrible happens to James, we just don't know why or how.
We see the story through Amelie's eyes, both as a child and an adult. As a mute girl, she's able to move about without raising suspicions, so she passes notes and takes food to James as he hides in his outbuilding. But because she's a child, she doesn't understand everything that's going on around her, which adds to the mystery surrounding James and what he may or may not be up to while in hiding.
I'm not sure that the split timeline adds too much to the story. It could have been a more action-oriented story if told during the one time frame, but I suspect the author wanted to slow it down to showcase the emotional aspects rather than write an action book.
Indeed, she writes beautifully, lyrically and heart-breakingly about the Great War, talking of the unknown ranks of soldiers lying under the scarred landscape, waiting patiently to be harvested by the local farmers. She talks of the rituals the locals go through every time a plough releases a body or part of a body from the bloodied soil even 16 years after the end of the great conflict. She talks of the munitions buried beneath the earth like bulbs of death, still threatening to take lives almost two decades after the war ended.
This book is brimful of the pain and suffering the Great War caused as it unfolded and for years afterwards. Amelie's life and that of her sister's is defined by their wartime experiences and neither have really moved on with their lives even as they grew older. Both carried secrets that locked them into a time and place that no longer existed. The end of the book holds some hope that things may change, but as readers, we already know that this part of France will see war come bearing down on it once more only a few short years later.
As the months go by, the danger increases as the Germans warn that any British soldiers they find in hiding will be shot as spies and the people sheltering them will be punished too. Over the weeks, James develops very different relationships with the two sisters helping him.
Twelve-year-old Amelie doesn't speak. She's not deaf nor is she mute for physical reasons, she just stopped speaking when her mother died some years ago and hasn't uttered a word since. James teaches her to communicate through shapes traced on her palm and Amelie feels like he's given her a voice.
James' relationship with Amelie's older sister, Therese, is very different. The two of them fall in love and begin an affair.
The story is split over two time periods: the first few months of the war and 1932, when James' grown-up son comes looking for information about his father. Because of this framing device, we know from the beginning that something terrible happens to James, we just don't know why or how.
We see the story through Amelie's eyes, both as a child and an adult. As a mute girl, she's able to move about without raising suspicions, so she passes notes and takes food to James as he hides in his outbuilding. But because she's a child, she doesn't understand everything that's going on around her, which adds to the mystery surrounding James and what he may or may not be up to while in hiding.
I'm not sure that the split timeline adds too much to the story. It could have been a more action-oriented story if told during the one time frame, but I suspect the author wanted to slow it down to showcase the emotional aspects rather than write an action book.
Indeed, she writes beautifully, lyrically and heart-breakingly about the Great War, talking of the unknown ranks of soldiers lying under the scarred landscape, waiting patiently to be harvested by the local farmers. She talks of the rituals the locals go through every time a plough releases a body or part of a body from the bloodied soil even 16 years after the end of the great conflict. She talks of the munitions buried beneath the earth like bulbs of death, still threatening to take lives almost two decades after the war ended.
This book is brimful of the pain and suffering the Great War caused as it unfolded and for years afterwards. Amelie's life and that of her sister's is defined by their wartime experiences and neither have really moved on with their lives even as they grew older. Both carried secrets that locked them into a time and place that no longer existed. The end of the book holds some hope that things may change, but as readers, we already know that this part of France will see war come bearing down on it once more only a few short years later.
April 24, 2018
This is the story, set in 1914/15 and 1932, of Amelie (aged 12, mute since the death of her mother, many years before this story starts) and her older sister Therese who live on the German-occupied side of the Western Front at the beginning of the first world war. Amelie finds and brings home an English soldier who has been wounded fleeing from the German advance. Their family continues to shelter him at great personal risk. Sadly he never makes it home to England - this is clear from near the start of the book, so not really a spoiler. Many years later his son comes wishing to find out his father's story. Why was his father awarded the Military Cross?
The story gives one a very good feel for what life must have been like in that place and those times. It is a story told by Amelie, so can be confusing at times, and the reader comes to understand the full story as she does.
The story gives one a very good feel for what life must have been like in that place and those times. It is a story told by Amelie, so can be confusing at times, and the reader comes to understand the full story as she does.
February 11, 2024
Great historical fiction
This book takes place during World War 1. A French family discovers a wounded British soldier and helps hide him from the Germans. The books jumps back and forth from war time in 1914-1915 to the present in 1932. I couldn't put the book.down and finished within a few hours. I highly recommend this book.
This book takes place during World War 1. A French family discovers a wounded British soldier and helps hide him from the Germans. The books jumps back and forth from war time in 1914-1915 to the present in 1932. I couldn't put the book.down and finished within a few hours. I highly recommend this book.
January 24, 2024
Gripping sad. Real
A very clear picture of ww1 in France. It showed how families were suck into the drama of war beyond sons going to fight. So sad yet touching in strangers connecting with kindness and sometimes love. Highly readable
A very clear picture of ww1 in France. It showed how families were suck into the drama of war beyond sons going to fight. So sad yet touching in strangers connecting with kindness and sometimes love. Highly readable
January 2, 2020
Nicely written, and a good story. It develops slowly, but that is part of its charm.
December 22, 2022
Of Silence and Slow Time is a good story. It moves at a slow pace to begin with and I nearly gave up but I persevered and I am glad that I did.
March 24, 2024
poignant and moving,a dreeascapee from another time.
June 6, 2024
A lovely way of seeing the first world war through a child's eyes, very poignant at this time.
January 25, 2025
I don't know why I had this book as I don't like war stories. Got part way through and diced it. Did nothing to capture me.
July 28, 2022
I received a complimentary copy of this exceptional historical novel from MyNextRead, author Catherine Bruton, and Lume Books. Thank you all for sharing your hard work with me. I have read this novel of my own volition, and this review reflects my honest opinion of this work. I am pleased to recommend Catherine Bruton to friends and family. She is an author I will follow.
Of Silence and Slow Time presents the turmoil of the Great War as experienced by the populous of a small village in Northern France in a much different light than I have encountered in my reading. Set in this village in alternating timelines in the first-person voice of the 12-year-old mute daughter Therese of the family who owned for generations the local cafe/pub, we see the war come in the summer of 1914 and see life in that same village, same family, throughout the war, and again in the winter, spring, and summer of 1932. We see that the repercussions of the war in 1914 will never be overcome. But it is possible to find a path to a sense of closure.
Reviewed on September 5, 2022, at Goodreads, AmazonSmile, and BookBub. Not available for review at B&N or Kobo.
Of Silence and Slow Time presents the turmoil of the Great War as experienced by the populous of a small village in Northern France in a much different light than I have encountered in my reading. Set in this village in alternating timelines in the first-person voice of the 12-year-old mute daughter Therese of the family who owned for generations the local cafe/pub, we see the war come in the summer of 1914 and see life in that same village, same family, throughout the war, and again in the winter, spring, and summer of 1932. We see that the repercussions of the war in 1914 will never be overcome. But it is possible to find a path to a sense of closure.
Reviewed on September 5, 2022, at Goodreads, AmazonSmile, and BookBub. Not available for review at B&N or Kobo.
April 25, 2012
Interesting technique of a story told mostly through the eyes of a young girl (about 11 years of age) who cannot speak. Switches between 1914 and a British soldier in occupied France and 1932 where the story has links and connections that go beyond the war.
October 21, 2015
A cleverly told tale, seen mostly through the eyes of an 11 year old, mute French girl. Wonderfully evocative of the era, with a well woven thread linking the era's -1914 and 1932 - revealing far reaching interconnections between the twin time-spans in this well written, emotional story.
February 14, 2024
The ending was disappointing otherwise 5 stars.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews