Book Review: On Distant Shores

Author: Sarah Sundin

Publication Date: August 1, 2013
Publisher: Revell
Series: Wings of the Nightingale # 2

Lt. Georgiana Taylor has everything she could want. A comfortable boyfriend back home, a loving family, and a challenging job as a flight nurse. But in July 1943, Georgie’s cozy life gets decidedly more complicated when she meets pharmacist Sgt. John Hutchinson. Hutch resents the lack of respect he gets as a noncommissioned serviceman and hates how the war keeps him from his fiancée. While Georgie and Hutch share a love of the starry night skies over Sicily, their lives back home are falling apart. Can they weather the hurt and betrayal? Or will the pressures of war destroy the fragile connection they’ve made?

"With her signature attention to detail and her talent for bringing characters together, Sarah Sundin pens another exciting tale in her series featuring WWII flight nurses. Fans new and old will find in On Distant Shores the perfect combination of emotion, action, and romance.”

His laugh had such a rich rumble to it. “See? We Northerners aren’t all savage brutes, and you Southerners aren’t all uneducated hicks.”

“I don’t know what to do with you.” The chief rubbed her forehead. “You’re such a good nurse, but you’re jittery. I can’t have you endangering patient lives.”

Daddy said privilege came with responsibility. The Taylors were blessed financially, and they had a responsibility to give financially. Georgie was blessed socially, and she had the responsibility to embrace outsiders.

“There’s a difference between being good to someone and being good for someone.”

Sarah Sundin won my heart with the first book in this series, With Every Letter. I was completely swept away in her character development and character interaction. She was able to draw me so close to their lives and their circumstances. I love the whole idea of flight nurses and the backdrop of WWII. We have the same scenarios reappearing in this book, just with a few new faces. Georgiana Taylor, who did appear in book one, is our main focus in this story. Georgie is engaged to Ward, her boyfriend that is waiting for her back home. So when she meets the handsome John Hutchinson, also engaged, she knows that he is certainly off limits. She can’t help but be attracted to him, however, and his honest nature and strong serenity are helping her get through a very difficult time in her life. Will she be able to resist?

Both Georgie and “Hutch” stole my heart. I loved learning more about their backgrounds and how they ended up in their current positions. Not many authors can make me become this invested in their characters. Sundin just puts so much spunk and life into each character she writes about and it is so refreshing to avid readers like me. The romance in this book was to die for, and honestly I liked the fact that each of these characters started off engaged to other suitors because I felt like it changed up the game a little bit. This wasn’t your average boy meets girl, falls in love, married by the end. They had obstacles and other factors in the equation. There was a lot of tension at times, but that’s what makes victory even sweeter!

Any book that takes place in WWII has my attention and usually my praise. Sundin masters this area as well. This was a harsh and scarce time for many countries, but Sundin really brings out the good in this war. She shows what the people who were fighting for their country were actually doing on their jobs whether they were in the air, out to sea, or back on land. I am always so impressed by her writing and her take on WWII. I could stay lost in this series forever, and honestly I wish she would write a novel for every girl in the 802^nd Medical Air Evacuation Transport Squadron!

***A copy of this book was provided to me by the publishers at Revell in exchange for my honest review***