dgt3
member
Reged: 29/03/2008
Posts: 79
Loc: Cornwall
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Has anyone out there read this book? I have just finished it today and absolutely loved it, until I got to the end!!! I hate that when you absolutely love a book and it ends in a way you don't like. I had so many unanswered questions. I understand the author maybe was doing a Dickens and wanted the reader to make up their mind about the ending rather than spell it out but then why spend so much of the book talking about minute details and then end it so quickly with all the threads left dangling? eg, how did Mariella and Nora get back? Did they get back? Was Rosa dead in Max's arms? Was Max dead or dying? Were they all going to die? What about Henry? What about Max and Mariella? This was just a few of the questions I had when I got to the end.
I would love to hear anyone else's responses.
Take care,
dgtx 
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DeepBlue
member
Reged: 16/02/2008
Posts: 280
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Hi I totally agree with you - still haven't resolved the end. Personally I think it was left that way to allow a sequel. Spoke to someone else who'd read it and they had a different take on it. It did however spur me on to reading Florence Nightingale's biography which was wonderful. She was an amazing woman espcially condsidering her background. Hope to use thsi book in our bookrgoup next months -soory maning lots of typos -end of a very long day
Pat
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feathers
member
Reged: 20/05/2007
Posts: 497
Loc: Tyneside
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I too was furious towards the end and decided she just ran out of steam. This must have been an issue as the paperback I had contained readers' group notes and one of the questions was 'did you find the ending satisfactory?'. For me, it wasn't so much that she found Rosa dead in Max's lap, but that it very quickly turned into a trite romance whereas the greater part of the book was a thoughtful commentary on the social mores of the time, the carnage of battle, the role of women and the changes in medicine, surgery and nursing. Both my grandmother and her sister became nurses around the time of WW1 and they were only just then beginning to be respected. Aunty Edie said her parents were horrified when she said what she wanted to do. I also remember her saying some of the girls wouldn't nurse German POWs but she did because she would want a German nurse to care for her brother if he was in the same place. He then died in the trenches in France in 1917.
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Aquarius
member
Reged: 19/01/2008
Posts: 1291
Loc: Ilkley, West Yorks
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Yes, I read this book too and totally agree! It was wonderful captivating stuff throughout but the end was soooo annoying! Both my daughters read it though, and it didn't seem to occur to them that Max might be dead! I really do need to know though!
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spa69
member
Reged: 30/01/2008
Posts: 12
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Hi
I loved it too! I thought the ending was abrupt, but better for that. After all, the story was about the search for Rosa and she was found. I think it was quite plain that she was dead, but found by Max (who was alive) and I just assumed that Max and Mariella then stayed together. Max told Mariella that both he and Rosa loved her in the last few pages. Did no one else get that? That's why Rosa ran from the doctor, who had an obsession with her. She thought Mariella loved him.
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dryad
member
Reged: 11/02/2008
Posts: 151
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If you have read The Rose of Sebastopol, you might be interested in my post - Met a Richard and Judy author last week! The author I met was Katharine McMahon. She mentioned that the ending of her novel had been criticised; she said that the open ending was deliberate and implied that she wanted the reader to imagine what happened next. I can understand many readers wanting their money back, if they are expected to do this!
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