Book Review:Upon the Mountains by Gale Sears

Upon the Moutains by Gale Sears

Nephi decides to leave his wife and child to fight in the war in Europe. He feels a duty to take care of his wife and child, and is unable to find work sufficient to support them, and so signs up for the Marines. So, he leaves Utah, Salt Lake, and his family to fight in WWI. The sights of war damage his sensitive soul and he may never return home, and if he does he’ll never be the same man. In Salt Lake his sister-in-law Elanor is discovering her war ground as she studies and finds out about a new flu epidemic. As the only woman in medical school she faces stiff opposition to her place at the medical school except from a few treasured souls. She must face influenza head on as it threatens the life of her family and dear friends.
I picked up this book wondering if it was part of a series, but some basic research didn’t really give me any answers about that. So, I went off and just picked it up. Low and behold it was the third book in a series and the annoying info dumps let me know of this fact as I read through the beginning. Yet, I still read on intrigued by the characters and it was well worth it. This is a very well written war novel that showed many different aspects of the war on the front and on the home front. I especially loved the characterization, which was nicely done especially for the children. They were so cute! The novel is able to stand alone, but I’m pretty sure the ending wasn’t as rewarding for me because I didn’t understand all the back story behind things, and the death of some characters didn’t really affect me all that much, and to add to that a lot of the changes that characters made were kind of meaningless on account of the fact that I didn’t experience the way they were before. Though, most of these instances were in minor plot threads of the book. In spite of this I still enjoyed the characters and the story. I would reccomend because it has been one of the most fresh and high quality historicals I have read for a while.
Author Website: http://www.galesears.com/501.html