Echoes of War

Through the lives of the Lammas family and their friends, Echoes of War captures the British experience of two world wars and the uneasy peace that lay between, and traces the beginning of the empire's end. With a wide cast of vividly drawn characters and ranging from Norfolk to Tuscany and Burma, this magisterial and profoundly moving novel testifies to the redemptive power of love and to mankind's enduring capacity for courage, compassion and survival.

English-born, Italian resident Rivire (Eros and Psyche, 1995) spins a thick family-saga that spans the decades between the two world wars, and follows the losses, loves, hopes, and histories of various branches of the Lammas family. An unhurried narrative style gives Rivire the chance to lavish great quantities of prose on the features of the English land- and sea-scape, and upon finely minor incidents. The memory of a young man lost to war, and the dread of war among those still living, decisively stamps the Lammas family, and ultimately leaves none of their lives untouched. With its leisurely exploration of the generational permutations of loss and fear, this story makes its point with variations that may seem too many and too subtle for patience. Yet the writing rarely sags, and will surely be enjoyed by fans of R.F. Delderfield and Colleen McCullough. For those with an undiminished appetite for extended historical fiction. -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.