Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #20112 in Books
• Published on: 2006-03-02
• Released on: 2006-03-02
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 432 pages

The Daily Express
"Despairing, contemplative and moving, the descriptions of these ordinary people draw you into the world of the Forties."

Mail on Sunday
"Almost every entry has its poignant or fascinating moments...makes our wartime past seem no more distant than yesterday."

Synopsis
'Snowdrops have been in flower for weeks. Violets are still waiting to bloom. Broad beans are showing their heads perkily. But I forget. We are at war. The boys in the village are leaving one by one.' - Maggie Joy Blunt. "We Are At War" continues Simon Garfield's successful formula of interweaving five ordinary lives from the Mass-Observation archive begun with "Our Hidden Lives". Of all the accounts written about the Second World War, none are more compelling than the personal diaries composed by those who lived through it. Beginning in the weeks before the war, and ending a year later with the Battle of Britain, the book will tell the story of the 'phoney war' on the home front. The five ordinary diarists are: Pam Ashford, an unmarried secretary at a large Glasgow shipping merchant; Tilly Rice who moves her children to safety in Cornwall, but returns to her home in Surrey just as the bombs start to fall; Eileen Potter, a social worker in central London; Christopher Tomlin, a God-fearing salesman doing the rounds in Preston; and Maggie Joy Blunt, familiar to readers of "Our Hidden Lives" as an elegant and reflective writer.

Customer Reviews

Enthralling
I read each person's account seperately, as they were becoming muddled in my mind. I was struck by the differences between four of the diarists and "Eileen Potter". Why was she included I wonder? All the others had fascinating, interesting tales to tell of their ordinary lives. Hers, by comparison was very dull and was also the most incomplete. With the other four I felt I knew them and had a deep interest in how they ended up in life.

Reading the four complete diaries was an engrossing experience. How different these people were to each other and how similar they are to people today. Nothing much changes, does it? I see that there is another book just published and I shall be buying that one, too.

Fascinating Glimpse of the Past
Very involving and eye-opening view of the past from the grassroots rather than the usual historical overview. I really got involved with some of the characters' lives and immediately started on 'Our Hidden Lives' when I finished.

A real time-machine!
The unfolding drama of wartime life is captured faithfully in these first-hand accounts. I wonder what would be the reaction of the diarists to know that in sixty years time their submissions to Mass Observation would be printed and made into a book. I suspect they would secretly be quite pleased that their efforts would be enjoyed by future generations - a kind of immortality. I was particularly moved by Christopher Tomlin's honest descriptions of the struggle to keep his family afloat financially while coping with the anxiety and sleeplessness of incipient invasion. A different world indeed.