**Review is slightly spoilerish**
Anna met and married Norwegian pilot Johan Vartdal in a whirlwind romance while he was on leave in England. Johan didn’t survive the final days of WWII and the book begins as a widowed Anna is making an extended visit to his homeland. She spends time in Oslo living with and socializing with fellow war-brides, and you will get endless descriptions of coffee parties and social gatherings that the ladies attend.
About halfway through, Anna finally travels to Molde to visit her aging father-in-law who wants to deed over a cottage nearby that is always handed down to a female member of the family. Anna’s plans were to return to England, but she’s drawn to the diary of the woman who previously owned the cottage. We finally get to see what is in this diary about half-way through, and then we get lots and lots of descriptions of life, marriage and children. Sometimes we read directly from the diary, and sometimes it is narrated back to us. There’s a love interest for Anna, plus a slight bit of tension about a male family member who has too much interest in something hidden in the cottage.
*spoiler warning* When that’s resolved, we get more endless exposition about Anna’s happy married life and children. *end spoiler*
Seriously, that’s it. I love hearing about new places and the customs and culture of the locals, but unfortunately that’s pretty much all you are going to get in this. You’ll learn about the food, you’ll attend plenty of tea/coffee parties and maybe a wedding or two, but there just isn’t any story to keep the reader interested. Library only, then buy it if you love it. If you are interested in learning more about Norway, I do highly recommend Laker’s This Shining Land set during the German occupation.
Kindle copy obtained via library loan.
Nice review, thanks for the recommendation on “This Shining land, I really do like this kind of book.
The House By The Fjord was a DNF for me. This was my note for it: pedestrian prose and a bland narrative style reminiscent of “true story” magazine articles.
I saw that you gave This Shining Land five stars. Now I am torn, because I found the writing in The House On The Fjord so soporific it made me cross Laker off my list of well-reviewed historical fiction authors to try even though I ordinarily give authors a second chance. The place and the period are undeniable drawcards for me, though.
I’ve read several Laker books, and for the most part enjoyed them. Her usual formula of independent woman with a career/business can get old after a bit, but still nice reads on the lite side of things. It has been a few years since I’ve read This Shining Land, but I have nothing but good memories, and the Norwegian Resistance movement was something I knew little about, so that was a big plus for me.
I checked the original publication year for This Shining Land. It is 1985, so now I am thinking about how an author’s style can change over the span of their career, and that perhaps Laker’s earlier stories showed more vigour. I may have started at the wrong end. I’ll make a note of This Shining Land for the next time I want to take a historical fiction trip to Scandinavia. Thank you for your thoughts!
House by the Fjord is completely different than any other Lake novel I’ve read. It’s like she phoned it in.
Reshelve as literary fiction, and the nothing-happens problem is solved!
Nicely snarky review.
Hah! I wasn’t even trying to snark. I think I wasn’t.
I know what you mean…sometimes I just have my snarkscope turned on and there’s nothing I can do about it.