The Wartime Sisters

The Wartime Sisters by Lynda Cohen Loigman  304 pages

A friend passed her Advanced Reader’s Copy to me, saying that she thought it would be something I would like….and she was right.  I loved the cover, and the blurb at the top of the back cover cemented that I wanted to read this: “In the vein of “The Nightingale” and “The Lilac Girls”….I was hooked.

Ruth and Millie are sisters, three years apart. As they developed, it became increasingly evident that they could not be more different than if they didn’t share both parents. Ruth was the plain, introverted one; Millie was a beauty from her first breath, a risk-taker. Longing for an affectionate bond between them, they had nothing in common. Ruth marries a safe, gentle man…a scientist. Millie falls for a bad boy, gets pregnant, and that’s the good part of her life. Even after their parents are killed in a car accident, the two sisters cannot seem to develop an affection for each other.

As America enters World War II, Ruth’s husband joins the Army, but instead of being sent to fight, her scientific knowledge gets him transferred to the Springfield (Massachusetts, I had to presume) Armory. Millie stays behind in Brooklyn, where the girls were raised.

Ruth’s life on the base is bucolic and well-order; Millie’s husband becomes increasingly violent. It doesn’t upset her when Lenny joins the Army, but soon she is a widow with a small child. When the two sisters finally reunite, Millie and her son come to live with Ruth and her family. While Ruth plays Officer’s Wife, Millie gets a job in one of the Armory’s factories. Then a truth from the past begins to haunt the sisters, forcing them to lean on each other.

This story has the dueling timelines that I like, but they seem off.  Here’s one of many examples: The narrative speaks of Ruth’s twin daughters, but readers aren’t even aware that Ruth has married.  In the next chapter, the reader gets the backstory. The past and present don’t seem to line up as they should. That’s the reason, “The Wartime Sisters” receives 4 out of 5 stars in Julie’s world.