Lavinia's War - Claire Gartrell

Lavinia Coates wanted to be a nurse in order to travel. She got her wish but, caught up in a nightmare, she got far more than she bargained for!

Lavinia's dreams of distant lands began as a child during World War I.

In a dismal puddle of English rainwater, she is attracted by the bright colours of the foreign stamps which inspire her future nursing career. Yet it is 20 years later, during the Blitz of World War II, before she breaks away from a boring job to the tropical heat of British Malaya - in more ways than one. In a non-stop whirl of daytime work and night time partying, she is finally in a job she loves and finds herself feted and courted too. One man stands out - who is he really, and is he sincere?

But it is December 1941, and her lover must fight for the freedom of the colony. Sick and desperately worried, Lavinia waits alone for news but soon realises she must flee for her life. In an epic and dangerous journey, she travels further and further, across seas and continents, away from the man she loves. Will she ever see him again?

This is a true story of love and loss, the call of duty and the powerlessness of individuals against momentous world events.

Claire Gartrell is an author and academic. Since completing her doctorate at Oxford University, she has continued an exciting and varied life as a nurse in the south of France and then in the Blue Mountains of New South Wales, Australia. She now lives in central Sydney. Lavinia's War is Claire's first novel, and she is currently working on a follow-up - a memoir of her own adventures and personal struggles throughout the 1970s, a story that has shaped this most unconventional life.