I was so happy to be chosen as an early reader/reviewer of this novel, and equally happy that "The Women" lived up to my hopes. Set during the Vietnam War, it shows the shift of American popular opinion, as the war went from being generally supported to the shock over governmental lies about fatalities began turning that tide. Nurse Frankie McGrath enlists as an Army nurse right after her brother leaves for Vietnam. Her father keeps a "Wall of Heroes" in his office and Frankie wants so much to be part of it. With little experience, just a nursing degree, she is unprepared in every way for what she will experience. Fortunately, she forges friendships with Ethel and Barb, nurses whose friendship will save her life again and again. She serves two tours, and finally goes home.

But if anything, life is harder than it was in country. People spit on her, and she hears that "There were no women in Vietnam" from fellow medical professionals who consider her a beginning nurse and ignore her combat experience. Her own parents have told friends that she is spent her time in Florence.. Frankie faces the struggles of many vets with the addition of being someone whose sacrifices are discarded.

Frankie has a terrific character arc, growing from upper middle class Catholic school graduate to combat nurse to fragile, damaged survivor fighting to find herself again. She's surrounded by other sharply-drawn characters and vivid settings. From page one I was pulled into the action.

"The Women" is a step forward for Kristin Hannah who seemed to have fallen into shoving her heroes into one disaster after the other, wearing this reader out. Frankie's story is filled with plenty of drama and challenges but nothing that makes you ask, "jeez, what next?"

What's also important about this book is that it covers Vietnam, a war people still don't like to talk about. Thanks, Kristin, for this excellent historical novel.

When twenty year old Frankie McGrath was told that “Women can be heroes” she aspired to make her father proud. Set during the turbulent Vietnam War this novel invites us into the lives of these brave women, the nurses, as they perform under the worst circumstances and rely on each other to get through this dangerous and unknown time. I was totally transported into their lives and read this in two days! I found the historical and political references so interesting I took to googled to learn more! Frankie, Barb and Ethel’s story will make you laugh, sick, and ugly cry, BUT it is one you won’t put down and you will think about it long after you write your glowing review!
#KristinHannah#NetGalley

A amazing and harrowing story of a young woman coming of age and stretching her wings as a nurse during the Vietnam war. I’m glad there are authors exploring the lives of nurses in wars other than WWII..

This might have been my favorite Kristin Hannah book, which is saying a lot..

Did you ever binge watch a series, and spend way too much time trying to get to the end, and then when you are done, you are sad. You miss the characters and you wish you hadn't watched it so fast? Thats what this book was to me. I stayed up WAY too late reading this, and finished it early the next morning. Now I am just sad it's over..

On it's surface its the story of women nurses in Vietnam. But it's also a story about love, validation, family and friendship.

I was a child when the Vietnam war ended. I knew how badly the soldiers were treated when they came home. But this story about the women really gutted me. It told the journey of what the went through over there (and I could never handle it) to how they adjust when they get home. I was 100% drawn in.

I loved getting to know more about what it was like to serve as a nurse during war. I loved the characters -even the ones I loved to hate. There were a few tiny things I could pick on if I needed to, but I don't need to. I would recommend this book over and over.

I did not expect to binge this as quick as I did but Hannah has such a way of sucking you straight into a story and I couldn’t put it down! I’m not a big historical fiction reader but I always enjoy Hannah’s writing, and the Vietnam War isn’t something i’ve seen addressed much in fiction.
we follow Frankie as a young 21-year-old volunteering as a nurse to injured soldiers in vietnam, but the last half of the book jumps a few years later after she has returned home to explore the war’s mental toll on Frankie and many others. I wasn’t alive back then of course but it feels like a really raw and emotional account of how soldiers and especially women were treated when they returned home from the war. The final chapter gave me chills.
the only thing I didn’t really care for here were the romantic subplots - we see Frankie throughout a few different lovers but i felt like we zoom right into their relationships without getting the time to invest in it or care about the outcome.
overall a really interesting and informative read, and it really did not feel its length!

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the copy of The Women by Kristin Hannah. Vietnam-era books are hard to find, so I was really excited to read this one. As usual, Hannah excels at creating three-dimensional characters that are easy to care about. I loved Frankie and her friends, and the power of their friendship. I also loved how the women are finally given the recognition they deserved back then. This is a heartbreaking read that brought me to tears many times. If you are too young to know about the war and its aftermath, or were too young to really grasp what was going on then, you should read this book. It's not a light read, but if you're looking for an engrossing story that’s beautifully written , don’t miss this book! I think it’s an important book that would benefit everyone who reads it.

Many thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's for the opportunity to read Kristin Hannah's The Women.

I wish I could put this book in the hands of everyone I know.

"The missing. The forgotten. The brave… The women.

From master storyteller Kristin Hannah, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Nightingale and The Four Winds, comes the story of a turbulent, transformative era in America: the 1960s. The Women is that rarest of novels—at once an intimate portrait of a woman coming of age in a dangerous time and an epic tale of a nation divided by war and broken by politics, of a generation both fueled by dreams and lost on the battlefield.

“Women can be heroes, too.”

This is, I believe, one of the most important books I have ever read.

This was one of the most gripping historical fiction books I’ve read. Kristin Hannah blends contemporary fiction with the backdrop of historical for a full immersive experience

There were times I could feel the setting in my bones and I loved Frankie. This book should be taught in schools