Unexploded

I knew nothing about the author before finding this book, but was hugely impressed by its literacy and fresh insights into what could have been quite cliched subject matter. A readable and gripping story of life in Brighton during the darkest days of World War 2, it has a nuanced and believable view of the moral issues of the time, and resists the heroic view.

«Unexploded» focuses on an episode if the Second World War rarely touched upon in other fiction namely the fear of an invasion of Britain in early 1940. Original, well-written but somewhat mundane, and ultimately little impressive.

Set in Brighton during the period of May 1940 to June 1941, when a German invasion was expected imminently, MacLeod’s novel explores how the life-upsetting alterations, challenge relationships that have previously seemed unchanging. The book also examines the support for Oswald Moseley and the suppressed ant-Jewish attitudes of some of the British, even as they opposed Hitler.
Macleod’s elegant and engaging writing looks at these issues through the live of Geoffrey and Evelyn and how their marriage is disrupted. Their love is challenge in previously unexpected ways as they see each other anew and as they also struggle to bring up their eight year old son, Philip, as he becomes involved in increasingly risky adventures with his show more friends.
Macleod’s fine writing involves the reader throughout and captures the danger of the time and makes for a revealing and moving novel. show less

War is about the clash of ideals. It brings about destruction and chaos and upheaval on a massive scale. It has been well documented in the history texts time and time again. But it also brings confusion and chaos on a personal level to people on the periphery of the conflict. And that is what Alison Macleod documents well in her novel Unexploded.

Page 5-6
In the shop that afternoon, Evelyn had clutched Tillie's list and gathered the items as if each were a talisman against uncertainty, and if the uncertainty was great, the weight of her basket was greater still. On her journey home, she balanced an oversized box of soap flakes, a storm lamp, parcels of candles, boxes of matches, a bottle of witch hazel, first-aid provisions, bars of show more carbolic soar, emergency lavatory paper and a bottle of cod liver oil. As she walked, she stopped several times to shake the blood black into her right arm, though she never let go of the plait of onions that she gripped her ribcage with her left.
When the King had surprised the country with his unprecedented call for a day of national prayer, it was warning enough. Whatever the BBC said, the situation could only be dire. Still, she'd procrastinated, pushing Tillie's list deep into a pocket and avoiding the town centre for most of that week - the seafront in particular, for she couldn't bear to see the boats lurching on to the beach and toppling with the wounded and the frightened.
Fear was an infection - airborne, seaborne - rolling in off the Channel, and although no one spoke of it, no one was immune to it. Fifty miles of water was a slim moat to an enemy that had take five countries in two months, and Brighton, regrettably, had for centuries been hailed as an excellent place to land.
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