Customer Reviews

The Soldier's Return

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It's a theme repeated endlessly ever since the Odyssey, and yet this story of a soldier's weary return from war reads like it's all brand new.

Following a grueling and horrendously brutal campaign in Burma in the waning days of World War II, Sam Richardson returns to his home, a tiny village in England's Lake Country called Wigton. There, as he has dreamed of for months and years, he is reunited with his pretty young wife Ellen, and his young son Joe, a baby when his father went off to war.

Soon enough, it becomes apparent that the happy reunion was only the tip of the iceberg. A tangled web of emotions, frightening to both Ellen and Sam, and unspoken by both, threatens to destroy the relationship they both want so badly to keep. Sam is haunted by the atrocities and death he has seen in the war, and can hardly keep in his own skin as he dreams of escaping to far-off lands to make a new start. Ellen, used to being on her own, is frightened by this stranger with her husband's face, and clings even more desperately to the village of her birth and the way of life she is accustomed to. And in between them is little Joe, accustomed to having his "mammy" all to himself, and now misplaced by a stranger he must call "daddy."

Alongside this very private drama of three very private people is the larger story of the village of Wigton, which suffered all manner of privations during the war--but whose people are still clinging strongly to village ways.

Bragg, who grew up in the Wigton area, has created a masterpiece, in my opinion. It is followed by "A Son of War," a continuation of the Richardson saga, and something I intend to read immediately.

Melvyn Bragg's The Soldier's Return is the memorable and poignant story of Sam Richardson, a young man from rural England who has fought in the Burma campaign in World War II and who then returns home to a world totally different from the world he has left--everyone and everything has changed.

Sam has seen such atrocity that he is now harder and less willing to show a soft side. His son Joe, now five, doesn't know him. His wife has been successful working two modest jobs and does not want to give them up. Sam has been exposed to the outside world, a world which has shown him how limited his future is in the socially inflexible world of Wigton, while his wife Ellen, in contrast, has been supported by the friendships, traditions, and familiarity of this community, where she knows everyone.

The tensions within the family and within individual characters grow and boil over, as stiff-upper-lip-ishness comes into conflict with the human need to communicate and share, creating real drama and intensity. Bragg's written dialogue is completely natural, and his descriptions and his narrative style are simple, as is his choice of vocabulary. The reader will have no trouble following the various threads of the story while learning much about Cumbria, post-World War II social upheavals, and the kinds of personal problems that may have been typical for many other young soldiers. Mary Whipple

Based on the reader reviews, Bragg is not well known, but those who have read him are impressed. In this book, his portrayal of the people in the north of England is masterful. They exemplify what Flannery O'Connor said about her family: that the only emotion they allowed themselves to express was anger. Loving, forgiving, and understanding thoughts run through the minds of both Sam and Ellen, but their expression is stifled in the hard atmosphere of their home town. They are at an impasse trying to decide whether to try to re-establish their lives in the familiar but devastated town or to risk everything for opportunity in Australia.

England took a long time to recover after WWII, and the efforts of Bragg's characters to put the deprivations and horrors of the war behind them are poignant. In 1946 rations were still short, housing was scarce, job opportunities demoralizing. After coming of age and proving himself in the jungles of Burma, Sam finds himself adrift without so much as a pat on the back. Ellen too has grown during her husband's absence, working, raising her young son, and finding support from an ad hoc family. She finds that Sam's return, which she's longed for for four years, doesn't automatically set things right.

The reader is rooting for these obviously intelligent and capable people. Their ultimate decision, literally the last gasp of the book, leaves the reader wanting the rest of the story. And there is a sequel I'm anxious to read.

I was very impressed by this book. It really sums the sense of 'making do' in post war Britain as well as dealing with the social constraints of the time.
At times I wanted to shout at Sam & Ellen to stop them making a fateful mistake! ...read this book.

This post-war book is thick with British idioms and terms, and so it was read slowly and deliberately! This is a very well-researched book. It describes a returning soldier's coming to terms with the horrors of war which he had experienced in Burma during WWII. The story opens with his return; very little of it is flashbacks, except when necessary, and only to tie it in to a current happening in the plot. The soldier's wife and young son have learned to be self-reliant while he was away, and their adjustments to his return are slow and painstaking. Well written, yet the ending was too hastily composed, in my opinion. A long, drawn out plot which ends abruptly, toying with one's emotions, is a characteristic of books which some like....I prefer a calmer resolution.

When Sam Richardson returned home from Burma after the second World War, nothinkg appreared to have changed in his hometown. However, traumatised from his experience, he found it difficult to adjust. He loved his wife Ellen and son Joe deeply, but having returned almost as a stranger to them, he had hurdles to cross to forge bonds with them. While he desperately wanted to get out of the familiar and routine surroundings, Ellen and Joe wanted to stay put almost as desperately.

Unsentimental and almost glommy, this book is not for readers looking for dramatic plots or romance. It simply moves the reader along with the thoughts and feelings of the two central characters, Sam and Ellen

This book has been read by myself and others in a reading group. Without exception, the group consider Melvyn Bragg to be a gifted writer who didplays a sensitivity and emotional deftness that's belied by his public persona.

Homecoming is not always the pleasant experience we want it to be. This is true of Sam, returning to rural England from fighting the Japanese in Burma. He is trying to rebuild his life, fighting his own inner turmoil with flashbacks of the horrors of the war he experienced. At the same time, his wife does not want to give up the jobs and independence she gained in his absence. Their communication is nil, further jeopardized by Sam's jealousy of the mother/son bond formed during the many years he was away. The author takes the reader into the lives of many touched by the war, with every attention to detail and sensitivity.Their frustrations become very real. With the offer of relocation to Australia, Sam has a renewed spirit, but Ellen is not willing to go and leave everything she knows behind.This is a great read about the struggles, sacrifices, and bonds of soldiers during war, and those very same concerns that surface with their homecomings.