“Land of the Living” by Georgina Harding

Within the 230 pages of this book there is not a wasted word, and the quality of the writing places the author amongst that elite band of writers who take real care in their work, and what they present to their readership.

Readers may recall the author’s earlier book “The Painter of Silence”, one of our all time best selling books. This, another war time based novel could in time sit alongside that one.

The story covers two periods in the life of Charlie Ashe, a survivor of an encounter in the war time jungles of the Far East.

After the war he has settled down near Swaffham, in Norfolk with his new wife Claire. They have inherited his uncle’s farm and we witness the seasons as he works the land, learns his new trade and tries to recover from his experiences in the jungle.

The second strand of the book are those events which now recoil as flashbacks into his mind, what we would now call post traumatic stress disorder. These begin with him, a Lieutenant in the Royal Norfolks, being rescued by a Naga village, sole survivor from a close group of four soldiers, and nursed back to health. Resultant from events we only gradually learn about as the story line unfolds. Georgina Harding’s descriptions of this village and others that he passes through on his eventual journey back to civilisation and British territory are authentically drawn as Charlie is eventually escorted by a native, he nicknames “The Viking” because of his tribal head dress, to a British colonial outpost where he is handed over to local DC District Commissioner Hussey.

Over two winters these war-time experiences haunt Charlie, and they are subjects he finds difficult to tell Claire in any depth, though they do touch upon them even visiting the widow of Walter his NCO.

An unusual tale by an author who seems to always come up with something different.