Wonderful story of the time period. Hard to put down! Tells a story of love and loss and how individual people can learn from those loses.

A different sort of story. I wish I would have been more sucked in by the characters. Just not exactly my writing style.

What would you do if you were on the brink and suddenly, somehow, pushed further? You do not know. None of us do. Not until the brink is right in front of us.

A woman trying her best to keep things together while her country is being torn apart by war. A mother trying to keep her son safe.

A man trying to find his place in the world. A man who wants to help his country but feels he falls short.

Wartime has a way of bringing people together…but also apart.

Said woman and man were as different as could be on the surface, yet brought together by multiple forces. What they don’t know is that they make a fantastic pair, if only they could get beyond the surface.

An unlikely pairing begins to come together to form a family, but then a son goes missing…just what and how far will a mother push herself in order to get her son back?

An overall interesting book, though a slow start with a great deal of buildup that ultimately ends quickly and left me somewhat unfulfilled. For those interested in thrilling historical fiction, you will find this enjoyable.

The German Messenger by MJ Hollows was an interesting read.

It takes place at the beginning of the war in 1940 when London is experiencing nightly bombings by the Luftwaffe. Ruth works for a local newspaper and volunteers by night during the bombings to help the local citizens, but Ruth has a secret that she will not tell anyone. Anthony is a teacher by day and a bomb warden by night. Their paths cross one night during a raid and they instantly do not like one another. As the story progresses, they find out they have a lot more in common than they think. Back to Ruth's secret.. someone finds out about it and instantly uses it against her, in the worse way - involving the kidnapping of her son.

My only complaint is that the book starts incredibly slow and took a very long time to pick up the pace, only to have a somewhat rushed ending. The author has a really good writing style and is incredibly descriptive, which also helped bring the story to life.

I read a number of WW2-era stories. They're some of my favorites. This one, however, fell a bit short for me. While there is a nice mix of mystery, secrets, and drama, the pace was too slow. It took quite some time for the action to really start, which made it hard to get and stay engaged. It did focus on a little-known part of history, so I appreciated that, as well as the fact that the story is told from both a child's and adult's perspective. But, I never fully connected with the characters. Ruth and Anthony weren't as developed as I'd expected. Overall, there was quite a bit of telling vs. showing, which also pulls the reader out of the story. Also, I am not sure the title is the best fit for the story.

A good read overall. The story is well told and the action and suspense will hold your attention. The characters are well developed and the story is well grounded with historical facts. My only disappointment (if minor), was I felt the author rushed the end of the book to get it over with. However, that point aside, I did enjoy the story.

Thank you to #NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.