The Picture She Took

The photograph had been taken in a cellar. An officer fed a wounded man a cigarette. A nurse, in breeches, boots and overcoat, stood to one side. All smiled for the camera.' In a bombed-out Belgian village, on the Western Front, Jude has made a life for herself in the midst of war. Nursing soldiers in her cellar hospital, she takes photographs wherever she can, capturing intimacy and humanity amid the stilled lives. And when the war is over she goes home, but to what kind of life now? Signed up to the hated Black and Tans to fight the revolutionaries in Ireland, Daniel has come home haunted, disfigured by a war he fought in but didn't understand. Six years later Jude's photograph awakens old wounds and triggers a crisis. It brings Daniel to meet Jude. And it propels both into a strange journey neither could have anticipated. People travel a long way from themselves in war. Some never return, but some might just find a way back. Set in England, Belgium and Ireland, The Picture She Took explores memory and the disturbing aftermath of war. This searching, lyrical novel is about the wars we wage against others and ourselves; it is a powerful story of flight and desire.


Genre: Historical