Book Review: ‘The Women’ by Kristin Hannah

Book Review: ‘The Women’ by Kristin Hannah
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Updated 17 October 2024
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Book Review: ‘The Women’ by Kristin Hannah

Book Review: ‘The Women’ by Kristin Hannah

Kristin Hannah’s “The Women” is a powerful and evocative exploration of women navigating the complexities of personal and societal challenges.

Set against the backdrop of the Vietnam War, the novel captures the essence of female resilience, friendship, and the bonds that connect women across generations.

Initially, the plot didn’t grab me. I was intrigued by the premise of women serving as nurses during the Vietnam War, but I wasn’t overly excited to dive in.

However, once I started reading, I found myself completely captivated — a testament to Hannah’s exceptional storytelling.

The novel introduces us to a compelling main character from an affluent family whose older brother volunteers for the military and heads to Vietnam.

This sets the stage for her internal conflict: Torn between societal expectations and her own desires, she decides to follow him by enlisting as a nurse.

This choice thrusts her directly into the heart of the war, allowing readers to witness not just her experiences but also the broader challenges faced by women in such roles during that tumultuous time.

Hannah’s vivid portrayal of the wartime environment struck me. Her descriptions of the sights, sounds, and even smells of Vietnam made the setting incredibly real.

I felt immersed in the oppressive heat and distant sounds of conflict; it was as if I were experiencing the war alongside the characters.

As I progressed through the book, I realized it felt like three distinct parts, each evoking different reactions.

The first part, set in Vietnam, was intense and gripping. The character development was exceptional; each nurse had a unique voice, making them relatable and memorable.

The second part deals with the main character’s return to the US. This transition is portrayed with sensitivity, capturing the struggles of veterans adjusting to civilian life after the horrors of war.

Many readers, especially those with military experience, will find that this section resonates with them. The contrast between the chaos of the battlefield and the mundanity of daily life highlights the inner turmoil facing returning soldiers and the societal indifference they often encounter.

In the third section, toward the end of the novel, the character has completed her journey.

She has learned a lot, and she has begun to recover, as has America, from the war. The reader is shown the life that she has established for herself, and it left me wanting more.

Hannah skillfully depicts the political climate surrounding the Vietnam War, including the protests and shifting public opinions.

This adds another layer, highlighting how changing attitudes affected both soldiers and the women who supported them.

“The Women” is a beautifully crafted narrative that transcends its initial premise to explore profound themes of identity, resilience, and the complexities of war.

Hannah’s powerful storytelling and deep character development make this a must-read, transforming what began for me as a lukewarm interest into an unforgettable literary experience.

This book not only tells the story of women in war but also invites readers to reflect on the lasting impact of conflict on individuals and society. I wholeheartedly recommend it. This story will stay with you long after you turn the last page.


What We Are Reading Today: ‘Fuji: A Mountain in the Making’

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Updated 04 May 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: ‘Fuji: A Mountain in the Making’

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  • It has been both a totem of national unity and a flashpoint for economic and political disputes

Author: ANDREW W. BERNSTEIN

Mount Fuji is everywhere recognized as a wonder of nature and enduring symbol of Japan.

Yet behind the picture-postcard image is a history filled with conflict and upheaval. Violent eruptions across the centuries wrought havoc and instilled fear.

It has been both a totem of national unity and a flashpoint for economic and political disputes.

And while its soaring majesty has inspired countless works of literature and art, the foot of the mountain is home to military training grounds and polluting industries.

 


What We Are Reading Today: ‘The Aquarium’

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Updated 04 May 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: ‘The Aquarium’

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  • Hemon’s writing grapples with displacement and identity, weaving together fiction, memoir, and history

Aleksandar Hemon’s 2011 essay “The Aquarium” is an exploration of parental love, grief, and the isolating toll of confronting a child’s mortality. The essay was first published in The New Yorker and later appeared in “The Book of My Lives” in 2013.

Written with unflinching honesty, the piece chronicles Hemon’s experience navigating his infant daughter Isabel’s diagnosis of a rare brain tumor and the family’s agonizing journey through surgeries, chemotherapy, and loss.  

Hemon juxtaposes the clinical detachment of medical jargon — “external ventricular drain,” “stem-cell recovery” — with visceral snapshots: Isabel’s breath on his chest, her laughter amid IV drips, her small hand gripping his finger.

At the heart of the essay lies the metaphor of an aquarium where the family exists in a suffocating bubble, visible to the outside world but severed from its rhythms.

Central to the narrative is Hemon’s elder daughter Ella, who processes her sister’s illness through an imaginary brother, Mingus.

Stylistically, Hemon oscillates between reporter-like precision and raw vulnerability. He rejects platitudes about suffering’s “ennobling” nature, writing: “Isabel’s suffering and death did nothing for her, or us, or the world.”

The essay’s power lies in its refusal to soften despair, instead confronting the “indelible absence” grief leaves behind.

Hemon’s writing grapples with displacement and identity, weaving together fiction, memoir, and history. A MacArthur Genius Grant recipient, he doesn’t just tell stories; he uses language to find pockets of hope in shattered lives.

Think of him as a guide through the chaos of modern exile — equal parts poet and provocateur.

 

 


What We Are Reading Today: Human Forms

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Updated 03 May 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: Human Forms

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  • In “Human Forms,” Ian Duncan reorients our understanding of the novel’s formation during its cultural ascendancy

Author: Ian Duncan

The 120 years between Henry Fielding’s Tom Jones (1749) and George Eliot’s Middlemarch (1871) marked both the rise of the novel and the shift from the presumption of a stable, universal human nature to one that changes over time.

In “Human Forms,” Ian Duncan reorients our understanding of the novel’s formation during its cultural ascendancy, arguing that fiction produced new knowledge in a period characterized by the interplay between literary and scientific discourses, even as the two were separating into distinct domains.

 


What We Are Reading Today: Utopianism for a Dying Planet

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Updated 02 May 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: Utopianism for a Dying Planet

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  • The utopian tradition, which has been critical of conspicuous consumption and luxurious indulgence, might light a path to a society that emphasizes equality, sociability, and sustainability

Author: Gregory Claeys

In the face of Earth’s environmental breakdown, it is clear that technological innovation alone won’t save our planet. A more radical approach is required, one that involves profound changes in individual and collective behavior. 

“Utopianism for a Dying Planet” examines the ways the expansive history of utopian thought, from its origins in ancient Sparta and ideas of the Golden Age through to today’s thinkers, can offer moral and imaginative guidance in the face of catastrophe.

The utopian tradition, which has been critical of conspicuous consumption and luxurious indulgence, might light a path to a society that emphasizes equality, sociability, and sustainability.
Gregory Claeys unfolds his argument through a wide-ranging consideration of utopian literature, social theory, and intentional communities. He defends a realist definition of utopia, focusing on ideas of sociability and belonging as central to utopian narratives.

 


What We Are Reading Today: ‘The Making of Barbarians’ by Haun Saussy

What We Are Reading Today: ‘The Making of Barbarians’ by Haun Saussy
Updated 01 May 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: ‘The Making of Barbarians’ by Haun Saussy

What We Are Reading Today: ‘The Making of Barbarians’ by Haun Saussy

Debates on the canon, multiculturalism, and world literature often take Eurocentrism as the target of their critique. But literature is a universe with many centers, and one of them is China.

The Making of Barbarians offers an account of world literature in which China, as center, produces its own margins.

Here Sinologist and comparatist Haun Saussy investigates the meanings of literary translation, adaptation, and appropriation on the boundaries of China long before it came into sustained contact with the West.

When scholars talk about comparative literature in Asia, they tend to focus on translation between European languages and Chinese, Korean, and Japanese, as practiced since about 1900.

In contrast, Saussy focuses on the period before 1850, when the translation of foreign works into Chinese was rare because Chinese literary tradition overshadowed those around it.

“The Making of Barbarians” looks closely at literary works that were translated into Chinese from foreign languages or resulted from contact with alien peoples.