Reviewed by Emma Crowley
“He will always be mine,” she whispers, as the tears in her eyes blur her vision. She holds her baby tightly, her breath coming out in ragged gasps, knowing that she will have to say goodbye…
Ukraine, 1941. War has ripped Katya’s country and heart in two. When her first love and the father of her child, a young Hungarian soldier, is killed in battle she thinks her heart couldn’t break any more. But when she discovers she is pregnant, she is forced to give their beautiful son away.
Then two soldiers knock down her door and force her into a truck. Katya is terrified, but as she is driven away to a labor camp her spirit remains strong. Because as she looks out the tiny window at the barren winter landscape she thinks only of her little Alexander…
She knows she must find a way to escape if she can ever see him again. But will she ever be reunited with her precious son? Or will they be torn apart forever by the war that has already taken so much?
Many thanks to Bookouture via NetGalley for my copy of The Soldier’s Child to review and to Sharon for having my review on the blog.
The Soldier’s Child is the first book that I have read by Tetyana Denford which is based on a true story and given the title I presumed it would be about said soldier Alex and his child who is also named Alex. The synopsis suggests one thing but in fact the reader is given much more as the story is epic in its span and duration and details how one family was ripped asunder by war and invasion. But, it also shows one women’s spirit and determination to do what others believed was the right thing even though she knew deep down that what was expected of her was cruel and wrong. One thing is certain, a mother’s love for their child never wavers and she will not find peace no matter how much she suffers until the truth comes out. This may take many years and countries and continents will have been traversed but in the end war, conflict and disruption may scatter people but the truth will always attempt to win out.
Part one starts off at a slow and leisurely pace where we are introduced to Katya and her family who live in the Ukraine. It’s 1918 and the horrors of war still linger with the Soviets on Ukraine’s doorstep. How little has changed in over 100 years and that’s what resonates with the reader as the further you delve into the story which only serves to only make this an even more emotive and at times upsetting read. Katya lives on a farm with her mother and father. Her father is ill and slowly wasting away. Her brother Adrian has married Nadiya and moved to Rohatyn where he works as a judge. The descriptions of the area where Katya lived were so beautiful and inviting and you can sense that pre war everybody was happy and content in their lives but threats, dark shadows and danger now lurk around every corner. Katya meets and very quickly falls in love with a Hungarian soldier named Alex. Romance blossoms and they hope to marry. Katya I sensed was impulsive, opinionated and had a fiery nature to her soul. She was proud and determined, both qualities which will stand to her when the worst befalls her later in the book.
The love between herself and Alex although brief rung true and when she falls pregnant, she wishes to keep the baby. But fate has other plans and Alex is killed in action. Not wanting scandal to ruin their family her brother and his wife insist she give the baby boy - Alex - up and they will adopt him and raise him as their own with Katya being known as his aunt. Nadiya was just so cruel, mean, spineless and horrible to Katya. She backed her into a corner where no other choice was possible for her. Let them adopt the baby or could she face going to a home for unmarried women and endure the shame associated with this. I felt desperately sorry for Katya that her one last connection to the man she loved so deeply was severed through no choice of her own.
At this point part two began and there was a huge jump in terms of the timeline and it was very disconcerting. I felt like I had missed out chapters and it was as if I had to try and fill in the blanks. This was a pattern that I had to get used to for the remainder of the book. At this point I wanted to know what happened to Adrian and Nadiya? (it was explained but only in the later stages). Alex is now a father and married to Sofia with a son named Ev. Was he very young when he married as mentioned down below this is where the timelines and ages became confusing for me. How did Katya meet her husband Volodymyr? Has she forgotten all about Alex now that she has another son Petro? It did become clear that she hadn’t but I felt these questions needed answers in part two rather than having them raised and not providing definitive answers until the last quarter or so.
The story then splits into two narratives. We follow Alex and Ev as they face a journey which no one would wish to make, which takes them far from their homeland. The reasons for this departure are valid but really they should never have been allowed to occur in the first place leading to a family devastated and enduring such secrets, lies and pain. To be honest, I preferred Katya’s viewpoint as opposed to Alex’s. I understand the necessity of its inclusion and the details given as to his journey with Ev but it was more of Katya I wanted to read about.
I found the chapters told from her viewpoint when she is sent to the gulag absolutely fascinating and full of horror and imagery that is hard to get out of your mind. The scenes set in the Gulag are particularly harrowing and knowing this is based around a true story only serves to highlight what hope and courage drove Katya on in the most harrowing of times. Once again, her resilience, persistence, tenacity, backbone and willpower nothing short of astounding. What sustains and carries her through the most agonizing and excruciating of times is the love she has for the son that does not know he is her mother. She is desperate and resolute that she can survive and return to share her truth. Whatever the repercussions of that truth may be she does not care she just knows that can’t let the lies continue as her pain and struggles have gone on too long.
At times the narrative of The Soldier’s Child is perhaps too stretched out and I will admit that for a lot of the book I was confused as to the timeline and what age characters were supposed to be as it jumps around an awful lot without a clear distinction as to what year I was reading about. This confusion lasted for quite some time and I felt the book was quite disjointed due to sudden leaps in the timeframe. I was just getting settled into reading about a character and then all of a sudden with a turn of the page there was a new setting with a different character and several years had passed. More clarification was needed regarding this as I feel it would have helped the flow of the story better. But once I got passed this and could figure out where things were going I was able to sit back and absorb the story in its entirety and appreciate it for what it was. That being a story of secrets, survival, determination and strength in the harshest of times when your world has been torn apart through tragedy and loss. It highlights the sacrifices a mother made and in doing so she only ever thought of the wellbeing of her son.
Overall, The Soldier’s Child was a very good read despite some of the issues I had with it. There were one or two instances where I felt some information was inaccurate in that some details changed but I sense this was a simple oversight when editing and they didn’t detract from the story. Tetyana Denford has written a story that is powerful and impactful full of hurt, pain, regret, heartache and repentance and if you have a few spare hours you wouldn’t go far wrong in picking up this book.
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