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FTC Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley. All opinions are my own. You will be spellbound by this stellar novel. So richly imbued with sensory details you'll be feeling every anguished moment and every golden ray of hope.' SUSAN MEISSNER, bestselling author of The Last Year of the War Captured by the German army, it seems they must be separated - but they have prepared for this moment. By cutting her hair and pretending to be mute, Izabela successfully disguises herself as a British soldier. Together, they face the terrible conditions of a POW camp, reliant on the help of their fellow POWs to maintain their fragile deception.
So Izzy is a Czech farm girl whose father and brother joined the resistance against Hitler. Bill is a British POW who has seen more than his fair share and is sent as a labourer to work on Izzy's farm where she lives alone with her mother. Bill and Izzy fall in love --it's instalove, sure--but it works because they do have time together as Bill teaches her English, as the cherry trees blossom, as they steal touches, as they recognize that love is accelerated in the midst of an urgent war when time and convention cease to exist. They marry and run away in hopes of Izzy catching up with the resistance, Izzy wearing her brother's clothes, head shorn, both aware that the encroaching Red Army is known of its disastrous treatment of women. Instead, they are captured and both send to Lamsdorf where Izzy's identity is so close to the front of a firing squad you can smell the prospective smoke. Inspired by the true story of a daring deception, a young Czech woman is plunged into the horrors of a Nazi prisoner-of-war camp to be with the English soldier she loves.
The Prisoner's Wifetells of an incredible risk, and how our deepest bonds are tested in desperate times. Bill and Izzy's is a story of love and survival, against the darkest odds. All I knew going in was the basic blurb: asha bandele met, fell in love with, and eventually married a man who is doing 20 to life for murder. This is the story of that relationship. It sounded interesting, though honestly I wasn't sure I'd even bother finishing the book. I had high hopes, but they weren't based on much and I knew I could easily be disappointed. But the writing is so powerful and direct, you cannot help but sink into bandele's story. It's so much more than the story of a woman who fell in love against all odds. bandele writes with such insight and honesty, and you find yourself moving through love, power, struggle, heartbreak, joy, hope, misery, sex, birth, death, discovery, and hundreds of other states. The story is relentless, and yet flows with absolute grace. They face appalling conditions in the camp and the constant fear that Izzy will be exposed. In an attempt to keep his new wife safe, he confides in a small group of fellow prisoners and together they protect Izzy from the other prisoners as well as the guards. These men become their family and soon Izzy cannot imagine life beyond the camp and her fellow prisoners. Should Izzy be revealed as a woman she
Yes, I tell them. Of course that’s true. But Rashid could also come home and be wonderful to me. None of us know tomorrow, only this moment, now, this time, already recorded in history.Izzy's disguise works. The couple are assumed to be escaped British soldiers and transported to a POW camp. However, their ordeal has just begun, as they face appalling living conditions and the constant fear of Izzy's exposure. But in the midst of danger and deprivation comes hope, for the young couple are befriended by a small group of fellow prisoners. These men become their new family, willing to jeopardize their lives to save Izzy from being discovered and shot. We follow Izzy and Bill as they escape the farm, travel in the night, sleep in the day, become captured, and endure the prison camp. And I love Bill. How I love Bill. Bill who is wired to be optimistic. Bill who thinks on his feet. Bill who marries a girl because they fit each other but is smart enough to recognize how little they know of each other as she steps into the horror of their new world together. I love how conditioned he is to find music, that he knits. I love that he is good natured and a loyal friend. I love that he sees time and again --from an early morning hoisting cherries--through a death march how strong Izzy is... but also how he recognizes the utmost sacrifice she makes for him. That she has opportunities to leave but that she is with him in this as in all things.
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