WW2 personal story making the headlines!
Good afternoon everyone,
I am currently reading Prunes for Breakfast by John Searancke and I try not to read reviews or articles about a book before I read it as I like to form my own opinions. However, when this article in the Tenerife News caught my eye yesterday I also found myself reading the review on Bookbag which the Rukia Publishing Tweet Team were formatting into tweets for the weekend. Prunes for Breakfast is an awesome read and extremely well written, so there is no risk of a change of opinion on my part. I wanted to share this with you in case you are looking for a great read this weekend.
I will be posting my review tomorrow :)
Check out the article below and The Bookbag review then click the link and pick up a copy, you will not be disappointed.
Have a great weekend,
Sarah Jane
From Prunes for Breakfast by John Searancke.
"I chose to write in a diary format, reconstructing the story of my father’s war through research and reproducing sections from his letters verbatim in between the telling of the tale. I have not found (although I am sure that it must exist) another book which details the humdrum and mundane, as well as the exciting and dramatic, experienced and recorded in writing by one man over the full period of World War Two, as he was turned from a civilian into a fighting soldier and leader of men."
Get your copy and step back in time with John Searancke.
"I chose to write in a diary format, reconstructing the story of my father’s war through research and reproducing sections from his letters verbatim in between the telling of the tale. I have not found (although I am sure that it must exist) another book which details the humdrum and mundane, as well as the exciting and dramatic, experienced and recorded in writing by one man over the full period of World War Two, as he was turned from a civilian into a fighting soldier and leader of men."
Get your copy and step back in time with John Searancke.
REVIEW FOR PRUNES FOR BREAKFAST
'Edward Searancke was called up to serve his country in 1940, not long after the outbreak of the Second World War and we hear his story from initial call-up, through the years of preparation for the invasion of France, to his eventual release as a Prisoner of War and return home to attempt to pick up the pieces of everyday life. It's a delightful mixture of the mundane and the dramatic (being surrounded and captured in an orchard in Northern France and his life as a prisoner of war) and much of the story is told through the genuine letters from Searancke to his wife which were handed to his son after his father's death. John Searancke tells us the story of his father's war.
Prunes for Breakfast tells the story of one man's war and how he felt about what was happening to him. Edward Searancke approached the war much as I suspect he approached his life - determined to get the best out of it and prepared to work hard to do so - and rose from Private to Captain in the course of four years.
The letters are not about great things, but the mundanities of living and his son's skill as an author is shown by the way in which his father's voice in the letters follows through into the accompanying narrative. The story is lightly fictionalised - but it's very difficult to see the joins.
Although the story concentrates on the personal it gives an excellent insight into the planning of the war. The telling is cleverly done - this wouldn't be my natural reading matter, but I was fascinated.
I began reading Prunes for Breakfast with interest, but found myself more and more drawn into the story, which was a real pleasure to read. I'd like to thank the publishers for sending a copy to The Bookbag.'
Find out more about John and his books at Rukia Publishing:
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