Out of the Blue in Q&A with Josh Lanyon

Jun 29, 2011 Paola rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favourite, owned-as-ebook, story-publ-d-in-m-author-antho-too

I was incredibly moved by this story. It’s short but very intense, and it addresses many contrasting feelings: loss, hope, responsibility, fear, love and desire, all within the context of World War I, beautifully and sensitively evoked.
I was crying for so many young lives lost to a senseless war. I thought Josh was able to capture really well the spirit of the time. He can portray the background to historical events with accuracy, respect and sensitivity, and that's IMO an even more laudable eff I was incredibly moved by this story. It’s short but very intense, and it addresses many contrasting feelings: loss, hope, responsibility, fear, love and desire, all within the context of World War I, beautifully and sensitively evoked.
I was crying for so many young lives lost to a senseless war. I thought Josh was able to capture really well the spirit of the time. He can portray the background to historical events with accuracy, respect and sensitivity, and that's IMO an even more laudable effort in a short piece than in a full length novel.
Though I really cared what happened to the MCs, not just in combat but in their private moments, a part of me was maybe even more involved in what happened to the minor characters knowing they could be killed at any moment and I enjoyed the camaraderie shown in their off-duty moments precisely because you dread how long it might really last.

This book made even more alert to the fact that, unless one has a family member or close friend who was involved directly in combat, it's difficult to realise the level of sacrifice sustained by soldiers around the world, not to mention what families must go through when they lose a loved one in a war.

I also realise there's often a lot to be revealed about a character (and a person) from the way they grieve about the loss of their loved ones.
The way Bat grieved about Gene's death told a lot about him, and together with that he learned a lot more about Bat from the way he cared about his comrades (even when admitting he couldn't afford to get too close to them).
His sense of guilt about the way Orton died affected him throughout the book, despite Orton was not someone he really cared about, and that also reveals a lot about Bat.

I tried hard to dislike Cowboy for his blackmail, or rather, ‘proposition’ he offers Bat in exchange for his silence, and for his brash, often all-too-knowing attitude. But he has a lot of redeeming qualities: he’s brave, honest and direct, and those are perhaps the qualities that make Bat attracted to him and unable to refuse continue seeing him.
The characters’ motivations in this story are sensitively explored; very little is said but so much is implied.
When I picked up this story and read the blurb, I wasn’t sure I was going to like it. But it turned out this was one of the best, most affecting and sensitively written Josh Lanyon books I’ve read.
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