Wake

Remembrance Day 1920: A wartime secret connects three women's lives: Hettie whose wounded brother won't speak; Evelyn who still grieves for her lost lover; and Ada, who has never received an official letter about her son's death, and is still waiting for him to come home. Can these three women ever let go of the past?

A compelling and emotionally charged debut about the painful aftermath of war and the ways - small, brave or commonplace - that keep us going. It touches feelings we know, and settings - dance halls, war front, queues outside the grocer - that we don't. I loved it.

A tender and timely novel, full of compassion and quiet insight. The author gives us a moving and original glimpse into the haunted peace after the Great War, her characters drawn by the gravity of the unmarked, the unknown and perhaps, finally, the unhoped for.

Wake is powerful and humane; a novel that charms and beguiles. Anna Hope's characters are so real; flawed and searching, and her prose so natural, one almost forgets how very great a story she is telling.

Superb ... beautifully crafted

A moving novel about the aftershock of the 1914-1918 conflict. ... unlikely many will prove better than Anna Hope's Wake

Absorbing and timely

Wise and insightful

A hit, we think!

Impressive and poignant ... moving and rewarding

Poignant ... stays long in the memory

ANNA HOPE was born in Manchester, and educated at Oxford University and RADA. The idea behind Wake came to her when she visited the Somme, where she was struck by the sight of so many rows of identical crosses, and wondered at the grief of the women they left behind. WAKE is her first novel.


Follow her on Twitter @Anna_Hope