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World War II. Downed during his first mission, James Hunter is taken captive as a German POW. To bide his time, he studies a nest of redstarts at the edge of camp. Some prisoners plot escape; some are shot. And then, one day, James is called to the Kommandant's office. Meanwhile, back home, James's new wife, Rose, is on her own, free in a way she has never known. Then, James's sister, Enid, loses everything during the Blitz and must seek shelter with Rose. In a cottage near Ashdown Forest, the two women jealously guard secrets, but form a surprising friendship. Each of these characters finds unexpected freedom amid war's privations and discover confinements that come with peace.
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Reviews
"The Evening Chorus deserves a special place on your reading list this winter."
Alan Cheuse, NPR's All Things Considered
"Humphrey's prose is spare, concrete, sculpted . . . . deeply rooted in the rhythms and imagery of nature. . . . Humphreys sees nature as something consoling, even redemptive."
The New York Times Book Review
"Scintillating . . . What Humphreys does so well, in beautiful, precise prose, is convey the shock of that violence, how it rends the everyday. I am very glad to have spent some of my moments on earth reading The Evening Chorus. I reached the end with a sense of wonder that so much life and pain and beauty could be contained in so few pages."
The Boston Globe