Small Wars

Small Wars

by SadieJones (Author)

Synopsis

Hal Treherne is a young and dedicated soldier on the brink of a brilliant career. Impatient to see action, his other deep commitment is to Clara, his beautiful 'red, white and blue girl', who sustains him as he rises through the ranks. When Hal is transferred to the Mediterranean, Clara, now his wife, and their baby daughters join him. But Cyprus is no 'sunshine posting', and the island is in the heat of the Emergency: the British are defending the colony against Cypriots - schoolboys and armed guerrillas alike - battling for enosis, union with Greece. The skirmishes are far from glorious and operations often rough and bloody. Still, in serving his country and leading his men, Hal has a taste of triumph. Clara shares his sense of duty. She must settle down, make no fuss, smile. But action changes Hal, and Clara becomes fearful - of the lethal tit-for-tat beyond the army base, and her increasingly distant husband. The atrocities Hal is drawn into take him further from Clara; a betrayal that is only part of the shocking personal crisis to come. The prizewinning and bestselling author of The Outcast returns with an emotionally powerful portrait of a marriage in extremis and a world-view in question. Sadie Jones has produced a passionate, gut-wrenching and brilliantly researched depiction of a 'small war' with devastating consequences; and in doing so, raises important questions that resonate profoundly today.

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More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 480
Edition: Reprint
Publisher: Vintage
Published: 15 Apr 2010

ISBN 10: 0099540525
ISBN 13: 9780099540526
Book Overview: The devastating follow-up to the massive bestseller The Outcast. What happens when everything a man believes in - the army, his country, his marriage - begins to crumble...

Media Reviews
Jones is fabulous at this, offering titbits of danger and discord while keeping a cool, matter of fact tone for the big horrors... This is, at heart, a moving love story * Sunday Times *
Jones's first novel, The Outcast, winner if the Costa First Novel Award, was a very hard act to follow. Her second, however, is even better... Jones's research is impeccable, and her emotional intelligence outstanding -- Kate Saunders * The Times *
In this exciting novel that resonates with contemporary parallels, Jones is unusual among women writers in focusing as much on the thrills and terrors of frontline action as its psychological fall out...it's a movie waiting to happen -- Emma Hagestadt * Independent *
Ambitious...uncannily good at the evocation of charged moments * Guardian *
Here Jones's talent really shows... In an excellent encounter with a military psychiatrist, the dialogue breaks like dry twigs -- Stephanie Cross * Times Literary Supplement *
Author Bio
Sadie Jones is a novelist and screenwriter who was born and brought up in London. Her first novel, The Outcast (`Devastatingly good', Daily Mail) won the Costa First Novel Award and was shortlisted for the Orange Prize. It was also a Richard and Judy Summer Reads number one bestseller and adapted for BBC Television. Her second novel, Small Wars (`Outstanding', The Times; `One of the best books about the English at war ever', Joel Morris), was published in 2009, and longlisted for the Orange Prize. Her third, in 2012, was The Uninvited Guests (`A shimmering comedy of manners and disturbing commentary on class... a brilliant novel', Ann Patchett) followed by Fallout in 2014 (`Intoxicating and immersive', The Sunday Times).