In Memoriam is the debut novel from Alice Winn and is a heartbreaking tale of queer romance in WW1.
In Memoriam has been on my Kindle for quite some time now. It’s survived my brutal clear-outs, yet it was never a book I was really drawn to. I have a real bad habit of only reading the newest books on my Kindle and forgetting about the older ones, so I decided it was time to give one of my slightly older books a chance. When I refreshed my memory about In Memoriam, something just clicked; clearly, it was the right time to read it! When I tell you I was not prepared for the rollercoaster this would send me on!
I’m going to be brutally honest, the first 10% of this, I was not vibing with at all and it did cross my mind whether I would end up DNFing it but once I’d broken through that barrier, wow. I won’t even string you along here. It’s the best book I’ve read this year and up there with one of my favourites of all time.
What is In Memoriam About?
England, 1914. Henry Gaunt and Sidney Ellwood are navigating life at their perfect boarding school, Preshute, in the countryside. Life has always felt like a safe bubble at Preshute but now war has broken out and the boys are dealing with more and more of their classmates enlisting. Each week the list in the school paper of Preshute boys who have lost their lives is getting longer and longer but the war is fresh, it feels exciting, enlisting is something to aspire to.
However, Henry Gaunt has his own private battles, he’s half German and his mother and sister strongly believe that if he enlisted and fought for the British, it would put a stop to the anti-German sentiment they’re feeling. But Gaunt is in love with none other than his charming and handsome best friend, Ellwood. He can’t leave him but he also can’t admit how he feels. Gaunt has no idea that Ellwood also feels the same way.
Gaunt enlists to help his family and escape his feelings but to his horror, Ellwood follows him. When the two find themselves on the front line with most of their old classmates, they quickly realise that the war isn’t as exciting as it had been made out to be. It’s grim, life-altering and death surrounds them. It’s only a matter of time before they lose another one of the friends. Or worse, one another. Homosexuliaty is still illegal and besides, neither one of them is sure that the other feels the same way. What they do know is they will never be the same again if they survive.
Book Review for In Memoriam
If you’re a sensitive soul like me, then you’re going to want to get your tissues for this book. For the last 45 minutes of the book I pretty much cried non stop.
I completely fell in love with both Gaunt and Ellwood and following along with their story and their transformations felt like a beautiful privilege. I’m honestly still thinking about them now, I think they have to be up there with two of my favourite characters of all time. I could have quite easily read even more about them. You could have given me a 1,000 page book on their story, and it still wouldn’t have felt like enough. I never wanted to leave them.
I’m not going to give any spoilers away here because you deserve to discover everything in this book for yourselves. Me telling you about it just wouldn’t be the same. One of the things I loved about this book is there are a couple of quite big moments in it, twists that in other novels my have been played up, yet they happen without any fanfare here they just quietly come along and rip out your heart but seem really understated. I loved this, it felt like it was sticking much more real to the way life happens.
The WW1 depictions in here are fairly grim but woven into it is this amazing tale of two young boys trying to navigate the emotions of their sexuality, losing friends and fighting in a war they were both to young to sign up for but did so anyway. It’s funny, its horrifying, shocking, heartbreaking and beautiful. In short it was perfect.
It’s extremely rare for me to fall in love with a book as hard as what I did with In Memoriam which is a testament to just have much I enjoyed it. I literally cannot pick a single fault with it. It’s easily in my top 5 books of all time now. Even rarer for me I’ve even now bought I physical copy of the book and I will be re-reading it. I never do either of those things! In all honesty, I could go back and read it again now but I don’t think my heart could handle it just yet.
It’s it’s not obvious, I highly recommend reading this book and discovering for yourself just how beautiful it is.
Have you read In Memoriam, or will you know be reading it after my review? Let me know in the comments!
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