Postcards from No Man's Land

This is a coming-of-age YA novel by Aidan Chambers. It’s about a teenage boy who goes to Amsterdam to attend a ceremony in honour of the English soldiers – including his grandfather – who died in WW2 in Holland. It’s also the story of the teenage girl who met and loved his grandfather during the war.

For some reason, I really disliked Chambers’ style. It’s a fascinating story about a particular incident during the war, but I didn’t feel that it was well-told; in fact, his style seemed to hinder understanding of what actually went on. There’s Jacob (the boy’s) story of discovering his sexuality etc in Amsterdam; there’s Geetrui (the girl’s) story of discovering love etc in wartime; and then there’s bits and pieces shoved in from other people, soldiers and women who were there, about one of the battles. There’s no clear overview of what actually did happen; Chambers instead focuses on the fact that Geetrui had the grandfather’s baby, which you could see coming a mile off. The language which Chambers deliberately tries to keep modern has sadly already dated, only a few years after its publication, and the things that the writer seems to find so shocking just aren’t to a modern reader. It won all sorts of awards, and I can see it being set as a high school text (especially the passages where Chambers amuses himself with various big words – there’s a term for that, but I won’t write it -) but it doesn’t work as a story, which is a pity, because it’s a particular time in history that I’d like to know more about.