Fascinating. We watch TV and movies about people caught up in circumstances beyond their control and it's always larger than life. This book, while hard going at times, shows that it isn't about heroics but survival.

Didn't get to read, book was archived whilst Kindle was broken

During World War I, Mary Thorp was a governess in a house in Brussels. When the Germans invaded and occupied Belgium, Thorp kept a diary of what was happening, even though German discovery of the diary could have put her and the family she worked for in serious danger. Thorp's account is a fascinating day by day depiction of life in Brussels during World War I. Recommended for history buffs.

3.5 stars

Interesting first hand account of life in occupied Belgium during World War I. Governess Mary Thorp lived a relatively easy life compared to the general population and often expressed concern for the less fortunate. Tales of atrocities and war deaths, food scarcity and expense, and constant harassment and looting by German soldiers made up daily life during a very long four years' time. This book might appeal more to students and scholars of the Great War.

I received an ARC via Net Galley in return for my honest review.

To me, this was a fascinating look at what it was like to live in upper-crust yet occupied Brussels during WWI. Being English, her family and friends were flung everywhere and communication was spotty at the best of times. There was very little trivial entries and she had access to various diplomats and other highly placed people that made her more aware of things. Yet, every day was a struggle and everyday things changed. What one diplomat said last night might be totally negated by another on the next. No one, including the Germans, thought it would last so long or that the cost would be so high.

The other part that was interesting and yet she was celebrating the end of the war a bit too much to cover, was just what happens when the occupiers leave. Your original leaders have evacuated years ago, there are no longer police, city councils or mayors (burgomasters) to jump back in the blink of an eye and take over. It must be absolute chaos for a while for many places after wars....as we've learned in our own time like Iraq.

I never really got into this book & really struggled to enjoy it.
The first 15% of the book (I was reading on the Kindle which is how I can be so precise) was background information concerning life in Belgium during the period of the diary. I found this to consist of facts about people and places presented in rather a bland format. I know this is only backgorund information but as it did make up a reasonable chunk of the book I would have liked to have found it interesting. I didn't.
Once we got onto the diaries themselves I was ever hopeful that it would all pick up but it really didn't. The information in the diary was very bland and frankly not particularly interesting. I had hoped for detailed information on how the family were coping on a daily basis and the lovely social history snippets of information which are so fascinating. In reality I found the diaries lacked character. They seemed to mainly consist of a "who's who" of wartime Belgium and a collection of political information. Facts such as people's death attempting to cross the Netherlands border were reported but in a very factual and bland way. I never felt a part of this diary and didn't feel the personality of the writer.
The major problem I had with the book was the footnotes - and weren't there excessive quantities! The diary had several diary entries grouped together (possibly a week but the days aren't mentioned only the dates). with the footnotes at the end of each section. This meant that you could be reading an entry and the footnote was on the next page or even the one after. This meant there was a large amount of flicking backwards and forwards between the pages as most entries had some sort of footnote and many had several. It is immensley difficult to settle into a book when you are constantly flicking backwards and forwards through the pages. I wonder if this is better in paper format with the footnotes on the foot of the corresponding page.
Neither the content nor the style of this book allowed me to settle back and enjoy reading this. I found the subject matter quite bland and dull and the excessive footnotes irritating to the extreme.

An interesting diary written during the occupation of Belgium by an English governess. Although the subject matter is intriguing to me, I found the book a little dull in places. However, some of the facts of those times were interesting. I read it on my kindle, which made it a little choppy. I feel it may have kept my interest more if read in paperback.