09 June, 2014

Book Tour: Battle Hymns by Cara Langston

02_Battle Hymns




Add to GR ButtonA second war. A second chance.

In December 1941, Charlotte Donahue is engaged to Nick Adler, a handsome, pre-law student at Georgetown University. Despite her studies at a liberal arts college, she expects nothing more than to marry her fiancĂ© and settle into a conventional life as a young American homemaker. But her future is unexpectedly disrupted after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. While Nick trains for the battlefront with the U.S. Army, Charlotte does her part by volunteering as a nurses’ aide with the American Red Cross.

Assigned to a convalescent ward at Walter Reed’s Army Medical Center, Charlotte discovers her passion lies, not in the home, but in tending to the wounds of injured soldiers, all of whom remind her of Nick. Here she is drawn to a mysterious soldier, Lieutenant William Kendrick, whose jet was shot down in the skies over Germany. As Will’s physical and psychological wounds begin to heal, he and Charlotte develop a friendship that will bind them together in ways they never imagined.

Battle Hymns is a poignant story of love, survival, and redemption set against the backdrop of the Second World War.


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About the Author


Cara is a novelist of historical fiction. She has two novels in the works. Battle Hymns is a historical romance set in Washington, D.C. from 1941 to 1943. It will be published on June 3, 2014. The Glassmaker’s Wife is a historical romance set in 1925 Chicago and is still very much in progress.

03_Cara LangstonCara has been an avid reader – especially of historical fiction, classics, and mystery novels – since she was young. She read all of the American Girl books when she was in 5th grade, even though her parents could not afford to buy her a doll. In middle school, she was obsessed with the only two Ann Rinaldi books in the school library. They taught her about the 1770 Boston Massacre and the Salem Witch Trials before her history classes ever did. And that was when Cara’s love of historical fiction was born. She didn’t begin writing, though, until her senior year at the University of Georgia, where she studied Finance and had already committed to a career in the corporate world. One day she will be able to quit working for The Man and focus on her writing. Until then, it pays the bills.

When she’s not writing or working, Cara enjoys drinking red wine, watching bad television, doing genealogical research, obsessing over the Duchess of Cambridge’s every outfit, and finding the best guacamole in Texas. Cara currently lives in Dallas, Texas with her husband and their dog.

For more information please visit Cara Langston's website. You can also connect with her on Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, and Pinterest.


Publication Date: June 3, 2014
eBook; ISBN: 9781311184443

Review:

Series: N/A

Release Date: 3 June, 2014
Publisher: Cara Langston
Genre: fiction/historical
ISBN: 9781311184443
Edition: Paperback
Rating: 
Review Written: 9 June, 2014



Battle Hymns falls into a genre that I find can either be really well written or horrible. Focusing around World War Two, Langston's novel follows the growth of Charlotte Donahue in the face of everything familiar being removed from her world. The world is at war, her beau's half a world a way, and nobody knows what the future holds for anyone.

Charlotte Donahue thought there couldn't be anything better in the world. She was doing well in her studies and her beau had proposed to her in front of the Washington Monument. Everything it seemed, was going just as planned. That is until the day of their engagement party, December 7, 1941. In the early hours, the United States is drawn into World War II, and despite Charlotte's dismay, the news overshadows her engagement party and draws Nick, her fiance, off into the war.

Things are lonely for Charlotte with Nick off at training, and her days are filled with longing until she returns to school for courses. For a while she's distracted, but by the time Summer comes around, Miss Donahue knows she needs something else to keep herself occupied lest she fall back into her stupor of sadness. After an outing with a friend, Charlotte decides that she should volunteer as a Nurse's Aid. Intending for it to be a Summer thing only, she quickly learns that she'll be required to do volunteering throughout the year. Undeterred, she agrees to the terms, finding out quickly that she enjoys this line of work very much and that it's a useful distraction. Slowly it evolves into so much more than that.

Langston's novel is fantastic, details precise and riveting. The novel itself is written in an easy to follow format, with sophisticated writing styles. The novel flows in a way that draws the reader further into the pages and invests them in the characters. They become attached in ways to the characters and honestly want to see everyone end up happy at the end of the war. 

I definitely recommend reading this novel if you get a chance. 

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