Kate Breslin takes readers on a historical tour de force all wrapped up in a touching romance about a Red Cross nurse in Belgium and her struggles to keep her family together during World War I. Along the way, readers learn about the underground resistance in Belgium and the horrors of war.

I have found very few books that talk about World War I in a historical fiction format. This book is one that talks about a Belgian woman who was born and raised in England dealing with being in German occupied territory. She has lost people from her family because of the chaos of war. She longs to find them and still grieves for her husband who was killed in the opening days of the conflict. While she cares for her patients in a German hospital, she secretly sends messages to the Allied intelligence. As the story progresses, the story kept me on the edge of my seat, longing to be able to read faster. This book includes romance, suspense, mystery and action. I loved how it came together at the end! I loved the characters and the plot.

Evelyn Marche’s family has been torn apart by war. Her husband is dead and her siblings are missing. Still Evelyn does her part both as a nurse in German-occupied Brussels and as part of the Belgian Resistance. When Evelyn hears rumors that her sister and brother may be alive, she is willing to do whatever it takes to find them and bring them home though it may cost her her life.

I have read a lot of books that take place in World War I but this one had a different focus then a lot I’ve read. Breslin does a nice job of conveying what it must have been like for people living in occupied countries. Many were faced with horrific choices in order to survive or have enough food to eat. Then they had to find a way to live knowing what they had done. It’s also interesting to see how friends and family had to keep secrets from their loved ones in this environment. It has to be hard not knowing who you can trust and turn to when you need help.

It took me a little while to get into the story but I enjoyed learning more about this time period. There were a few twists and surprises along the way and a very satisfying conclusion.

Thank you to Bethany House for providing me with a free e-copy of this book. I was not required to leave a positive review. All opinions are my own.

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But first, plotty stuff:


Evelyn Marche is a nurse currently working for the resistance while playing nice with the Germans in war-occupied Brussels. Her life is a barrage of secrets propelled by a haunted past. While she works at her aunt and uncle’s café and saves lives from both sides of the war, you know that she is just going through the motions. She’ll stay alive for her mother, for the Resistance that needs her, and to retrieve her siblings, lost in France.

But underneath Eve’s complicated and complex world of intrigue and her highly skilled spy work, she goes through the motions, rendered an automaton by the death of her pilot husband years before.

A tragic sequence of circumstances thereafter pricks at her constantly and she is but a shell of a person with really nothing to lose after life and love were ripped from her.

When detoured from a night time assignment by a plane crash in Brussels Park, Eve never expects she will find herself face-to-face with her supposedly dead husband, Simon Forrester. Now, caught playing a dangerous game of roulette, she’ll have to risk his trust to save his life ---even as she keeps the darkest secrets from the person who should know and love her best.


GUYSSSSSSS what we have here is one of Rachel’s FAVOURITE ROMANTIC TROPES: something I like to call The Pimpernel. For those of you familiar with Orczy’s classic ( and if you aren’t what have you been doing with your life?), it features a married couple who due to secrets and mistrust are torn apart even as they STILL LOVE EACH OTHER DEEPLY FOREVER AND EVER and WANT TO SHARE KISSES AND TOUCHES AND EACH OTHER FOREVER AND I CANNOT EVEN DEAL.

Here, like Sir Percy, Simon is rattled by the fact that his beloved and rediscovered wife may indeed be a traitor while Eve is confronted with the treacherous fact that the return of her husband means finally spilling a secret that has ruined her at core.

AND I JUST WANT THEM TO TAKE EACH OTHER IN ARMS AND TALK IT OUT


WHAT WE HAVE HERE IS A FAILURE TO COMMUNICATE and oh is it ever achingly, seethingly , bone-tinglingly delicious as time is meted out in slow, languorous romantic breaths and you are all: OH PLEASE END THIS INSANITY AND KISS FOREVER

It’s really lovely and done so well: especially when embroidered with sweet tantalizing scenes from the past. We see Simon and Eve fall in love and must reconcile the sepia-tinted light of these remembrances with the hardened, challenged and war-torn people they are at present.

OF COURSE THEY STILL LOVE EACH OTHER and would die for each other a thousand times over but THEY CANNOT TELL EACH OTHER without risking their respective causes and Eve is near rendered mute by a secret that clogs her throat and catches her breath and she wonders if Simon could ever truly love the woman who, out of desperation, was forced to make a lethal choice.


And what is AWESOME about this, reader friends, is that the longer the game goes on, the more confusingly intricate the web becomes. You think that everything is smoothed out like a crease in your favourite pencil skirt, but NO, she throws another wrench into things because she takes DELIGHT IN TORTURING US. To add to the torture, she has a lovely and poetic way of painting a physical connection between our two leads that is whisper light and passionate and alluring—while reminding us that their true connection is strung together with a deeper knot. The more we see Simon and Eve in their respective roles for the cause, the more we are met with the commonalities that surge between them and can truly buy into their connection and story on an inherently intelligent level.

Breslin also does well at painting both sides of the conflict in sympathetic light. Eve’s ability to understand the plight of the German enemies she waits on ( and whose lives she saves as a skilled nurse) even as she aids the allied effort are human and as rooted in an impossible situation as she is. Breslin also (of course, its Breslin) impresses an impressive understanding of culture and verisimilitude as is trademark in her historical fiction.

But, mostly, and above all, she makes you love. She makes you love the ginger-haired Scotch pilot with the calloused hands and roguish burr and his Eve--- a stroke of genius in the name--- the woman who could be his saviour or the downfall of his life and his heart…. Again.


A series of games, clues, breathless escapes, creaks and snippets of war on the European front, you will have to navigate a world of double-agents and betrayals. But rest safe in the hands of Breslin’s competent pen, her fully realized characters and … of course… an “OMG YOU DIDN’T THIS IS THE BEST EVER PIMPERNEL ROMANCE AND I CANNOT EVEN”



I can’t even, guys. And for the last time she did this to me and ruined my life with the most agonizing kind of word bliss, read NOT BY SIGHT

Thanks to Bethany House and Netgalley and Kate Breslin for ruining me for the real world

Kate Breslin came onto the scene with For Such A Time. It was a great book that sparked a lot of national discussions. While I enjoyed her novel and didn't see anything wrong with the novel, I couldn't wait for more stories from Breslin. When she finished Not by Sight, I enjoyed that novel just as much. When I saw she was writing another novel, High as the Heavens, I couldn't wait to read this novel too. Luckily, Breslin knew what is expected from the genre and gives it to her readers.
The writing is clear and concise. I jumped back and forth from Eve and Simon's perspective a number of times, but Breslin allows there to be a break in the chapter or go to another chapter. As for the setting, I could imagine that I was in Brussels during the late 1917's. I could feel the hatred run through the characters as they dealt with the demons from their past.
The characters of Eve and Simon jumped off the page. Eve is a brave woman who tries to forget the horrors of what happened to her in her home town and tries to sneakily pass on secret messages to the allies. I admire her ability to work with and under the Germans while trying to betray them on a daily basis. Then enters Simon, her husband, Eve does everything she can to bring him back to health and then sneak out of the country without going back to Germany. As for Simon, he is a man who is injured and spends most of his time healing in a bed. I really can't say that much about him. Yes, he loved his wife, Eve, and he did do brave things before he became injured, but nothing changed in him. Or Eve for that matter. Both of them had a goal and they worked really hard to solve that goal. Externally. Not internally.
The plot started from the first chapter and kept moving. There were many moments in the hospital, trying to get Simon better. Majority of the plot focused on Eve and Simon reconnecting with each other after not seeing each other for three years. During the story, Eve and Simon are both trying to find out who the double agent is, without the other one knowing what the other one is actually doing. The plot is an original one, but it didn't keep me glued to the page.
Fans of historical romances would be delighted to find another story to fit the World War I genre with a bit of spying to round out the plot. Fans of Myra Johnson's Till We Meet Again series might enjoy this new book by Breslin. Highly recommended.
I receive a complimentary copy of High as the Heavens by Kate Breslin from Bethany House Publishers and the opinions state are all my own.

Another thrilling WW2 read by one of the best Christian historical authors out there! This book was fascinating and exciting with well developed characters and fast pace action that kept me thoroughly entertained. I love the amount of research that was put into this book and it really made history come alive.