If you follow my blog to any extent, it is highly probable that you have read about Kristin Hannah and the tremendous respect I have for her as an author and a storyteller. In yesterday’s post, I mentioned how Hannah’s works are the reason I have broadened my reading genre preferences, and I have yet to read a novel of hers that I don’t enjoy.
I would love to be able to say, at some point in the future, that I have read all of her books, and while I’m picking my way through them, one by one, I wouldn’t say there is any sort of order I’m following. Rather, it’s a matter of which of her books I can easily access, whether it be a physical copy or an audiobook. I just finished Home Front, and, shockingly, it’s excellent.
Home Front tells the story of a middle-aged woman named Jolene who loses her alcoholic parents at a very young age. As a result of failing to receive any sort of love from her mom and dad, she vows to love her children and family unconditionally one day, and that is exactly what she does once she marries her husband, Michael, and has two daughters with him – Lulu and Betsy.
Jolene is a helicopter pilot in the army, and when she is deployed to Iraq with her best friend, also a helicopter pilot, she realizes that the changes she and her family experience as a result of the war and Jolene’s position with the army may be too drastic to mend or accept.
Home Front is a brilliant story about the horror and significance of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, specifically in the context of veterans. It’s incredibly moving, emotional and powerful, much like most of Hannah’s works, and it is positively a read and not a rid.
Photo by Susan Q Yin on Unsplash
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