The only second Kristin Hannah book I’ve ever read, and it certainly didn’t disappoint.
Gripping from the beginning, harsh and so descriptive.

Following her brother's death in Vietnam Frankie volunteers to be a nurse in that war & the story follows her harrowing experiences there, together with the bonds of friendships.

Very educational read

Thank you for the ARC copy

I adored this book. It tells the story of Frankie (Frances) who after training to be a nurse volunteers in Vietnam - the first half of book tells of her experiences as a rooky to a veteran. The second half addresses how she copes when she comes back to the US. It was really fascinating to read about experiences of Vietnam especially from the point of view of women which is much less talked.

An absolutely stunning novel about the women who served in the Vietnam War and were forgotten. Not many books can make me cry but this one is one of them. Following the life of Frankie McGrath who followed her brother into the war ad a nurse. It is horrifying yet moving at the same time and just prooves how useless War is.. Beautifully written as are all Kristen Hannahs books it certainly gies to the top of my list for one of my best books this year.

Kristin Hannah shares a brilliant insight into the Vietnam war from a nurses perspective. 20 year old Frankie comes from a Navy family, and after her brother flies out to Vietnam she decides to join as a nurse hoping to serve her country, but ultimately she wants to make her family proud.

This book tackles so many topics that I want to talk about but probably won’t be able to fit in this post so I’ll do my best to condense!

The first half of the book is action packed, introducing a very young, naive Frankie to the realities of war. Some of the scenes are so heartbreaking and hard to read, with civilians often being targeted and coming to the hospital for treatment. I couldn’t help but think of some of the horrific images we’re seeing come out of present day wars and wonder why this is still going on.

The second half looks at Frankie’s return from ‘Nam where she is treated, not like a hero, but with disgust and made to feel ashamed of her service. The world she returns to is very different and she comes back a different person due to the experiences she’s endured. You can see the change in her perspective and her frustration that others don’t feel the same.

She is suffering from PTSD, although it is only in the early stages of being a recognised condition at this time. The second half of the book is definitely a mixture of emotions, where we see Frankie battling with her rollercoaster emotions, showing that recovery is definitely not linear.

“in love she’d been too cautious for years, and then too impetuous. In retrospect, it all felt haphazard.”

I love this quote when she’s looking back at her twenties. It sums up this period so well, I felt life was haphazard, never mind someone who’s living with the backdrop of war and suffering from not yet diagnosed PTSD.

This is an amazing coming of age book, with incredibly strong relationships and learnings and I would highly recommend!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Kristin Hannah is one of my favourite authors! I've cried buckets on reading The Nightingale, felt immersed in Alaska in the Great Alone, The Four Winds had me shuddering but ..but..but...The Women didn't live up to the expectations which one comes to build from a face. The premise is excellent and so promising but somewhere in between, I lost the plot....Nam war is a sensitive and volatile topic and this book had so much potential, I only wish the author hadn't meandered from it.

Absolutely loved this. It is everything Kristin Hannah does best: incredible sense of place and historical period, heroine you root for, great love story. Have recommended to many many people.

Such a riveting account of the Vietnam war told through a brilliant piece of historical fiction. I thoroughly enjoyed it and would recommend it.

I didn’t know very much about the Vietnam war, and nothing about the women who were there. I couldn’t stop reading this book, and like how it described both Frankie’s experiences of war, and the lasting trauma and difficulties with readjustment to civilian life. It had me feeling a lot of emotions throughout, and I would fully recommend it.

Kristin Hannah has a knack for writing historical fiction about wartime. I last read The Nightingale and had devoured it in one sitting. The Women kept me just as engaged and I stayed up late to finish it.

We get to witness the impacts of the Vietnam War on Frankie McGrath. Raised in a sheltered bubble, she's ready to make her mark on the world by volunteering as an army nurse - with a faint picture of what it entails and all the hopes and dreams of making a difference. Kristin Hannah spears no expense describing the horrors Frankie is thrown into - you either sink or swim while there, and she manages to adapt to the change with the help of two fast friends - Ethel and Barb. While a harsh reality with clearly depicted trauma and unflinching accounts of atrocities that took place, our author's softened this by threading in some romance to this part of the story, and building on the relationships between the three women - Frankie, Ethel and Barb.

While there are quite a few different romance leads in this novel (most of who had their pitfalls), I found the bond with the three friends to be a balm for the rest of the novel. We see Frankie struggle with PTSD on her return from war - her spiraling outlook and at times apathy, anxiety and depression compounded by the shame she feels from the hate the public throws on veterans and soldiers for participating in the war, along with her frustration that no one believes women are in Vietnam.

We get to see a few ups on Frankie's journey towards accepting her new reality, though often times cruelly snatched away, and above all we see the support needed from her friends and family around her to help pull her through. While the middle portion of the book was tough to read, there was some light at the end of the tunnel and I appreciated how Kristin Hannah brought Frankie's arc to a close for this novel. We're left envisioning what might be next for her, and the future looks hopeful, if not altogether a completely happy ending.

Thank you Pan Macmillan and Netgalley for providing me a copy for review!

Although I have read only one Kristin Hannah book in the past, because of her popularity and hype associated with her new books, there was a certain expectation when I started reading this. Unfortunately the book failed to meet that expectation, but I enjoyed listening to the first part of the book. Like most of her other books, the premise is based on actual historical events. In 'The Women', the Vietnam war and the participation of women in the war and the treatment of Vietnam veterans once they returned to America are addressed.

Frances McGrath comes from a family with a long history of decorated war veterans and her dad has photo frames of their family men who fought in various wars -the wall of heroes, in his study. The book is in two parts, the first part being Frankie's experience in Vietnam as an Army nurse and witnessing suffering and death first hand, trying to save soldiers whenever she can and when she cannot just staying next to them and holding their hands in their last moments. She also falls in love in Vietnam only to have her heart broken. She makes life-long friendships and creates memories as well as nightmares that will haunt her the remainder of her life. I really enjoyed reading Part 1 of the book and few events described in the book were so emotional that it brought tear to my eyes.

Part 2 of the book concentrates on Frankie's life after her return from the war. She struggles to fit into a society that expects her to forget Vietnam and just continue living her past life. She cannot talk about her war experiences, in fact her parents are too ashamed to admit that Frankie had been to Vietnam. There is no hero's welcome for Frankie. This part of the book dragged and they were so many chapters that did not do anything to move the story forward. It was appalling to read how so many refused to even accept that women were present in Vietnam. Women's contributions in the war were largely forgotten or ignored. This was an epic story that I enjoyed reading in bits and parts.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for an advanced copy of the book.

I discovered Kristin Hannah with this book and it was really a great discovery.

The book tells the story of Frankie, who enrols to go to Vietnam as a nurse during the Vietnam war. She comes from a well to do family and naively thinks that this will make her dad proud and she will have her place on the hero wall at home. Her time in Vietnam is very rough and she witnesses first hand what a horrible conflict it is. But also she makes solid friendships with other women who are there, like her. Then, she returns to the US and it is harder than she had thought. She suffers terrible post traumatic stress and she finds that society is not admiring the heroes of the Vietnam war, but rather the opposite. She also realises that people think there were no women in Vietnam, they were invisible. She sets out to rebuild herself and to contribute to the voices of the courageous women that were in Vietnam.

I really enjoyed reading this book. It is a rough read at times but it is also bringing to life this episode of history through the eyes of our different characters, whether Frankie, her friends, the troops in Vietnam, and others in society like her parents or her employers who did not realise what people returning from Vietnam had gone through and were still going through the rejoin society. The characters are interesting and beautifully written into the story.

It is a well researched book which brings to light the role and situation of women who were in Vietnam. I found the authors' notes interesting and I learned a lot about the context around the book on Kristin Hannah's website. This book is a tribute to all these women whose testimonies found their way into this story and to those who worked tirelessly to give them a voice and a visibility, for example at the Vietnam Women memorial founded by Diane Carlson Evans. It was a very moving insight into a complex moment in history and what it meant for the many whose life were shattered by it.

Well this was definitely an enjoyable and emotional read. It educated me on things that I’d never even considered about the war before and will help bring awareness to all of the women were in Vietnam. Would definitely recommend.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for an advanced digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you Netgalley for my review copy of this book.
Been a very long time since a book has moved me so much to bring on tears as well as laughter. This book was one of them.
With unpredictable plot, great characterisation and moving events, this book has been well researched and written with such taste and thought, you would think that the author was there.
Superb.

Wow, what a book. This blew me away with its power and beauty. It's full of love and war and struggle and depth and is an important story told so beautifully. Mesmerising.

Wow, what a book! Hard to put into to words how poignant and hard hitting this book is, Kristen Hannah just has a fantastic way of telling a story and this one will stay with me for a long time!

What an amazing novel from a female war perspective. Some predictable twists and quite a few people raised from the dead but it worked in the novel.
Kept me hooked the whole way

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for my copy of this e-arc!

Wow. She’s only gone and done it again. I laughed and cried. Hannah knows how to write an emotion provoking book. Everytime I thought we were getting somewhere good for Frankie boy was I wrong but that ending? I’m so please. She deserves the world.

This book was perfection. It was realistic which is what I loved out it so much. Everything was as up and down as real life, because real life doesn’t always happen the way we want but we always find the right path!

Going to Vietnam was the best decision she made in the end. Every part of me sobbed in the last 10% of the book. It was everything I could’ve dreamed about and more. I loved Frankie. I also loved that it took her so long to find herself, her purpose because again it was realistic. We don’t always know who we are, especially, I could imagine post-war. No one would know anything because you’ve just lived in a battlefield the last 2 years.

Again, Hannah’s writing highlighted the detriment to forgetting the role women played in helping in the Vietnam war and all wars since. Women are capable. Women are heros. They can be and they are. They will continue to be.

This piece of women’s fiction is everything I needed in the moment. It was a gentle reminder that women are always forgotten, even when we speak up our experiences are lesser. That female friendships are what hold us together. Some of my longest and best female friendships have shaped me into the woman I am today and will always be grateful for that, and them.

To women everywhere, you are and will always be a hero.

Yet again, Kristin Hannah has ripped my heart out of my chest and jumped all over it. And yet again, I’m just fine with that.

Frankie McGrath volunteers to go to Vietnam as a nurse, in the hope that she’ll be put up on her fathers “Hero’s Wall”. She arrives a naive idealist, and leaves emotionally scarred with no hope of support when she gets home.

In Vietnam, Frankie meets her best friends, who will always be there for her - two equally amazing women. They help her through PTSD, the end of relationships and substance abuse. The three women join the fight for recognition of Vietnam vets - where they are repeatedly told that they couldn’t have been there.

This book is in two parts: Vietnam and its aftermath, and honestly, both halves are equally harrowing.

This is such a powerful story. A story wanting recognition for the female nurses in Vietnam. It certainly puts their experiences out there for everyone to see.

The Women will be a book that I’ll be forcing into friends hands with the promise that they’ll love it, but they’ll be traumatised (I believe I made similar warnings to friends after I read The Nightingale).

Highly recommended.

This wasn’t the book I was expecting when I first read the blurb. I was expecting to sob, but not a single tear was shed!
I found the topic of the book fascinating & it’s made me want to find out more.
BUT unfortunately a few things let this book down… the pace & length… too slow & long.
The drama was worthy of storyline in Eastenders. I mean I get it but poor Frankie just couldn’t catch a break!
Needless to say, the writing was beautiful & it’s not put me off the authors books at all.
3.5*

Incredible. What a gripping read which was hard to put down. The horror of what people lived through and all because they were Jewish. Would highly recommend this book