Why a Booktrail?
1940: War is raging. A woman finds a baby abandoned on a bus…
We Must Be Brave
What you need to know before your trail
As German bombs fall on Southampton, the city’s residents flee to the surrounding villages. In Upton village, amid the chaos, newly-married Ellen Parr finds a girl sleeping, unclaimed at the back of an empty bus. Little Pamela, it seems, is entirely alone.
Ellen has always believed she does not want children, but when she takes Pamela into her home the child cracks open the past Ellen thought she had escaped and the future she and her husband Selwyn had dreamed for themselves. As the war rages on, love grows where it was least expected, surprising them all. But with the end of the fighting comes the realization that Pamela was never theirs to keep…
A story of courage and kindness, hardship and friendship, We Must be Brave explores the fierce love we feel for our children and the astonishing power of that love to endure.
Locations
Reset- England - Southampton
- A: Southampton
- B: Southampton Common
- C: SeaCity Museum
- D: Beacon Hill
Travel Guide
Travel BookTrail style to Southampton
The towns of Upton, Waltham and Barrow End in the novel are fictional but Southampton and the surrounding areas is of course real as is what happened there during the war.. As in much of England at the times, bombs were falling on the city of Southampton and around and people feared for their lives. If a baby had been discovered on a bus shepherding people to safety then, the story in the book could well have happened.
Now we are passing the mauled high street, the piles of masonry still strewn about like a carnivore’s leavings. I used to imagine the enemy rebuilding the high street after our conquest but now people were clearing rubble sweeping it down to the shore-line for hard-standings and new quays.
The German presence is palpable:
“Caisson, jetties, fuel channels to feed the gathering boats and trucks and tanks and surely every yard of it gathered by the Luftwaffe.”
This is a story of war and confusion, of women and men doing what they can to stay together, of families not wanting to break up or lose sight of one another.
Booktrailer Review
Susan:@thebooktrailer
A very heartfelt and emotional read. From the first chapter, when that baby is found on the bus, you’re drawn into a weepy tale but one of hope and human strength. Bonds between parent and child is special; during war time especially so, and this book reminded me of the tales of villages up and down the country where the WI was the embodiment of the community ( as in the TV show Home Fires) and where women had to go to extraordinary lengths just to survive.
Ellen and Pamela are two very extraordinary characters and I was rooting for both of them all the way through. This story is very realistic and I imagined much of it did really happen to people during the war. Innocent people whose stories we never hear of. It also makes you question what you think you would have done given the tough decisions Ellen has to make. How war affects us, how one decision in war affects us and how one split decision can have so many far reaching consequences. It had a little bit of the Light Between Oceans about it and is definitely a weeper to keeper!
Booktrail Boarding Pass: We Must Be Brave
Destination : Southampton, England Author/Guide: Frances Liardet Departure Time: 1940s
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