Two Storm Wood: Uncover an unsettling mystery of World War One in the The Times Thriller of the Year

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There are many, many fictional books about the Second World War which are as sad and as beautiful, and I have read some real belters, and I am in no way shrugging off the important of those books. The background of this novel is not so often mentioned in fiction: the effort to find, identify and bury thousands of soldiers who fell during the WW1. The suspense skyrockets as the various plot threads converge, putting Amy in heart-pounding danger, with a stunning final twist on the very last page. Defying convention, hardship and impossible odds, she heads to France, determined to discover what became of the man she loved. Traumatic and gruesome and heartbreaking, but beautifully written and I plan to lend it to anyone and everyone.

I found myself picturing how I would act and be there, in those situations, and truly I could never picture the 40 year old me doing what Amy does. Gray has written a novel that not only goes to the heart of the devastation of war but also a mystery with a solution that actually made me gasp in surprise not once but twice. Immersive and eerily atmospheric, Gray’s novel delivers vivid historic detail and gripping suspense, aligning more closely with Dan Simmons’s Drood(2009) and Washington Irving’s The Legend of Sleepy Hollowthan to most WWI thrillers.I loved the unpicking of the letters to and from home that challenges and demonstrates the incompatibility of these two worlds, poles apart. WWI was a terrible cultural shock for the people who lived through it, and this novel manages to get the feel through beautifully. My advice is that you get a copy of the book , settle in and start reading, you will forget to stop . She too must confront the unspeakable horrors of war that have scared everyone directly or indirectly involved.

After a single turn the road straightened out, vanishing into the distance like a strap pulled tight across the land. There are also hints and clues scattered through the book as to how the events of the 17th August played out, and the fallout from them afterwards. Amy changes from a woman who is barely allowed out to visit a friend, to someone who will make her own way to a foreign country in the aftermath of a war. In this thriller set on the battlefields of the Somme after the end of World War I, a woman investigates the disappearance of her fiancé. Amy finds herself questioning her understanding of Edward but she never stops looking for him - Gray does a great job of shifting your view without ever introducing Edward's perspective.

Her stalwart approach annoys the army officials who are tasked with the horrendous job of recovering the bodies of these soldiers and trying to identify them and then burying in the cemetery’s that have been commissioned by the War Graves Commission.

It was the perfect blend of thriller and historical fiction that had me on the edge of my seat more than once while reading it. As the clear up of the front continues and the fallen are located and shown the respect they deserve the discovery of the Two Storm Wood massacre sends a shiver through the army. But it had only taken me a couple of pages to realise how much the book was drawing me in, with both the smooth flow of the Authors words and the tale that was unfolding before me.An aspiring lifestyle influencer with a terrible and wayward boyfriend, her life has shrunk to the size of a phone screen. It is inconceivable, the appalling conditions of the battlefield and trenches- how anyone could come out of those circumstances undamaged- lives changed permanently, if one survived. Can Sergeant Lindsay Boxer solve one of her toughest cases yet – the murder of her estranged father? Their humanity was what came through, their personal experiences creating compassion that didn’t disappear even in the face of the most gruesome revelations. The bandages had been off for a fortnight but the disfigurement was as bad as ever: the sunken cheek, the taut, shiny brow, the mouth folded into a permanent sneer.

This title will go down in my personal reading history as one of THE BEST stories that I had the privilege to listen to. Amy Vanneck’s fiancé is one soldier lost amongst many, but she cannot accept that his body may never be found. He had only been able to speak for the last few days, but he had been a good listener, never tiring of the major’s old case- histories from before the war.Books tend to focus on the fighting itself and how it affects the men and the families back home, but we don’t seem to read about the immediate aftereffects. The characters discovered details and information slowly, mostly talking to each other or working out things they learned. It is a dangerous task too, as there are deadly booby traps that claim new war victims, when a woman, Amy Vanneck, arrives determined to find the body of her missing fiance, Captain Edward Haslem, of the 7th Manchesters, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Rhodes, missing presumed dead. The utter bleakness of the battlefields is painted in shades of unrelenting brown and grey, and the mud almost becomes another character in the book.