Mrs Lieutenant - Book Review

Recently I was lucky enough to review a book from Mother Talk. You all know how much I love to read and am constantly talking about books on my blog, so when the opportunity arose to not only read a good book but one that would touch so close to home, I jumped for joy. The book is called "Mrs Lieutenant" and it's written by Phyllis Zimbler Miller.

When I first received the book, I immediately skimmed through it and thought that this was the perfect book for me, it's a book about military wives and who better to relate to it than me, a fellow military wife.

What I didn't realize is that it's about Officer Wives and while I'm not one, the same fears and worries that they have, are the same fears and worries that I have with my soldier husband. Times may be different but it's the same thing.

The book follows the lives of four women, coming together for the first time at Ft. Knox, Kentucky, as their husbands go on active duty as officers in the U.S. Army. These women are completely different, they have different values, they have different ways of thinking and living but they put all that aside to support each other and to help each other deal with the struggles and the roles of being Officer Wives.

I was completely captivated by the writing, it kept me hooked to the last page and it made me smile, nod, shake my head...feel for these women and remember myself as a newlywed military wife and the strangeness of being in a new base.

From the book:

They had their whole lives to look forward to if only their husbands could survive Vietnam. In the spring of 1970 - right after the Kent State National Guard shootings and President Nixon's two-month incursion into Cambodia - four newly married young women come together at Ft. Knox, Kentucky, when their husbands go on active duty as officers in the U.S. Army. Different as these four women are, they have one thing in common: Their overwhelming fear that, right after these nine weeks of training, their husbands could be shipped out to Vietnam - and they could become war widows. Sharon is a Northern Jewish anti-war protester who fell in love with an ROTC cadet; Kim is a Southern Baptist whose husband is intensely jealous; Donna is a Puerto Rican who grew up in an enlisted man's family; and Wendy is a Southern black whose parents have sheltered her from the brutal reality of racism in America. Read MRS. LIEUTENANT to discover what happens as these women overcome their prejudices, reveal their darkest secrets, and are initiated into their new lives as army officers' wives during the turbulent Vietnam War period.

Mrs Zimbler did an outstanding job of portraying life during the Vietnam War, I learned a lot from this book, not just about the era during Vietnam but also the way that people of different backgrounds lived...it was surprising to me at times. I also love the fact that the author writes from experience being a former "Mrs Lieutenant" herself during the 1970's, she even includes a photo of herself and her husband at the beginning of the book. Loved it.

So thank you Mother Talk for a great book, I truly enjoyed it!