By the author of the madly popular Her Royal Spyness series comes a social history tale of women's fiction. Miss Emily Bryce has to obey her parents when they forbid her from signing up for war work. Her brother has been killed early in the Great War, and they don't want to lose her as well. She knits and visits hospitals near their West Country home. After she turns twenty-one, however, she volunteers for THE VICTORY GARDEN.

The Women's Land Army is a topic I've only recently seen covered, because it lacks the drama of frontline nursing. Women were required to take on many roles as healthy men over five foot tall were conscripted. Returning soldiers were too badly wounded to carry out farm work, and petrol was in short supply, so manual labour and horses were required. Emily is determined to do her bit for victory, and she won't be sent overseas.

The reaction from Emily's parents is priceless; they want her to work in an office, not toil like a peasant. The young lady just wants to be free, and she will get a wage and board. At once she meets Daisy, a housemaid who has escaped a life of drudgery. Emily starts to realise how little she's prepared for hard physical work. But she is determined to cope. And on her days off, she's going to be near the hospital where an Australian is recuperating, Flight Lieutenant Robbie Kerr. Her parents disapprove of him, but Emily has already noticed that after the war there won't be enough English men to go around. (As anyone who has read The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie will know.)

The first thing the ladies delight in doing is removing their corsets. They are a good hearty mix and demonstrate their capability. I spotted a scene like the one in "Private Benjamin" where the heroine's parents come to try to get her out of the army. I'd like to think most parents would not react that way, but rigid class structures were being smashed for the first time. We see this again when, assigned to work at a grand house, Emily naturally goes to the front door but is told to use the kitchen entrance. And the Land Girls visit a village pub, normally the province of men -- but there are no men under seventy in the village, apart from the Reverend.

Emily becomes fiercely independent and achieves more than she'd ever dreamed. She carries on the work of a line of herbal women, knowing tragedy as well as joy. THE VICTORY GARDEN is a good way to commemorate the Great War and those who were left behind. Sit back, add honey to your mint tea, and enjoy this well-plotted and carefully researched book.

Book Summary

From the bestselling author of The Tuscan Child comes a beautiful and heart-rending novel of a woman’s love and sacrifice during the First World War.

As the Great War continues to take its toll, headstrong twenty-one-year-old Emily Bryce is determined to contribute to the war effort. She is convinced by a cheeky and handsome Australian pilot that she can do more, and it is not long before she falls in love with him and accepts his proposal of marriage.

When he is sent back to the front, Emily volunteers as a "land girl," tending to the neglected grounds of a large Devonshire estate. It’s here that Emily discovers the long-forgotten journals of a medicine woman who devoted her life to her herbal garden. The journals inspire Emily, and in the wake of devastating news, they are her saving grace. Emily’s lover has not only died a hero but has left her terrified—and with child. Since no one knows that Emily was never married, she adopts the charade of a war widow.

As Emily learns more about the volatile power of healing with herbs, the found journals will bring her to the brink of disaster, but may open a path to her destiny.

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