The Heroes’ Welcome
London, 1919. In a flurry of spring blossom, Nadine Waveney and Riley Purefoy are married. Those who have survived the war are, in a way, home, But Riley is wounded and disfigured, normality seems incomprehensible, and love unfathomable. Honeymooning an a battered liberated Europe, they long for a marriage made of love and passion rather than dependence and pity. In Kent, Riley’s former CO, Major Peter Locke, is obsessed by Homer. His hysterical wife, Julia, and the ouyng son they barely know attempt to navigate family life but are confounded by the ghosts and memories of Peter’s war. despite all this, there is a glimmer of a real future in the distance: Rose Locke, Peter’s cousin and Riley’s former nurse, finds that independence might be hers for the taken, after all. For those who fought, those who helped, and those left behind, 1919 is a year of accepting realities, holding on to hope, and reaching after new beginnings.
‘The Heroes’ Welcome’ is the second of the series that opens with ‘My Dear I Wanted to Tell You’.
From the press
If you read one novel about the effects of the First World War this year, make it this one
The Times
Young possesses in abundance emotional conviction, pace and imaginative energy
The Guardian
[A] tender, elegiac novel. Others have been here before, of course, from Sebastian Faulks to Pat Barker, but Young belongs in their company
Mail on Sunday
From Readers
Brilliant, passionate and intense
Elizabeth Buchan
Loved every minute of this wonderful sequel. From page one you open the door to a past and immediately unite with it. Brilliant and beautifully written with words which linger long after the book is done.
Reader
This book is a brilliant follow up to the excellent ‘My Dear I Wanted to Tell You’ . . . In both volumes there is a very cleverly told parallel which emphasises the physical and mental traumas which not only the returning soldiers but also their families must contend with. The Heroes’ Welcome contains humour and suspense as well as tragedy. Louisa Young writes very well indeed. I feel as though I know these characters personally.
Reader
