People do love a bit of nostalgia porn, and A Ration Book Christmas, set during the first months of the Blitz, does not disappoint there. Though bombs fall, and bodies are pulled from the rubble of London's pummeled streets, the horrors of World War II are only ever touched upon here with the lightest of brush strokes. At the fore, instead, are the themes of familial and romantic love; the war a story telling device to demonstrate the importance of these bonds.
The men are away fighting, and the Brogan family – three generations of women, and a young boy – seek to navigate love, family life, and war on the home front. Bonds are strained, with misunderstanding and miscommunication providing much of the drama. And Jo, the youngest of the Brogan sisters, is suffering problems of the heart with her beau, Tommy Sweete.
Through Tommy Sweete and his brother, we explore further the theme of family bonds, frayed for the most part. A mother who could have done better; a brother with a reputation for villainy; and Tommy, who it seems is trying to be a good man in a mad, bad world.
Jean Fullerton obviously did her research, recreating day-to-day life of the 1940s with attention to the details. The songs on the radio, the food on people's plates, the jobs women did . . . all described to paint a picture of the time. And she paints the picture well, albeit perhaps with a slightly rosy-tinted focus on the quiet pluckiness and Keep-Calm-and-Carry-On attitude we Brits sold off some time in the seventies or eighties. Around about the same time we privatised our water companies.
We're mostly just a nation of miserable grumblers these days, tearing into eachother at the first opportunity over Brexit or COVID . . .
Sorry, where was I . . . ?
It's a little cosy in a Call the Midwife sort of way*. In a Sunday evening telly sort of way. And if you, dear reader, are looking for a razor sharp anti-war book, a visceral polemic against the insanity of nations sending people off to die in the mud, you won't find that here.
Bodies buried by bombs in rubble are mentioned in the same way as songs of the time. They are touched upon as a world building device, but not much else. There is no exploration of how the horrors impact the characters mentally or emotionally, except in passing; the danger of the Blitz is a plot device used to explore the family and romantic dramas playing out between the characters.
Now, dear reader, you might take all of this as criticism, but I don't mean it to, not really. There is value in stories told with a lighter touch, and nowhere is it written that every story set during the war years need be Catch-22 or All Quiet on the Western Front. I make these observations simply because they are a part of what I noticed as I read. And, it is likely, they say more about me than the book.
Reviewers can be a snobby and snotty lot. I mean, who do we think we are anyway? Self-appointed judges of taste and worth?!
The central theme of the book is love; love between family, friends, and lovers. Setting the story in London during World War II firmly demonstrates the importance of this central theme. With much of normal life changed by fighting, with necessities rationed, and luxuries almost non-existent, it is the bonds of friendship and family that gives hope.
Everybody makes do, takes joy in the little things, and has a plucky can-do attitude. Even the villains are more misunderstood or misguided rogues than they are true miscreants. The fascists and Nazis are quite firmly in the background, at enough of a comfortable distance for the reader to get cosy between the pages of the book.
There's a sense that, for all the drama, things will work out in the end, and everyone will live happily ever after. That everyone will get what they deserve.
Does the book romanticise the past? Um, no, I suppose not. But, yes, it does only cast glances over the abhorrence of war, choosing to focus on the quiet strength of people living their daily lives instead. And there is little sign the characters are effected in any way detrimental to their wellbeing by the destruction and death they see; their hearts and minds are mostly concerned with family and lovers, not emotional or mental wounds endured by wartime.
It's a charming book, well written and entertaining, and one that I might recommend to anyone who finds a little magic in stories told with a heavy dollop of nostalgia. For it is the period during which this story is set that really lends it its charm.
If you would like to purchase A Ration Book Christmas, you can do so here, with bookshop.org supporting local independent bookshops around the UK.
*Full disclosure: I can quite happily settle down to an episode of Call the Midwife, and am not immune to the charms of a story that explores heavy issues with a bit of tea and cake thrown in for good measure.
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