I just finished The Rose Code by Kate Quinn on this rainy/snowy Manitoba spring day and I have to say it was a great rainy day read! I started The Rose Code a few months ago when I found out that a friend of mine was also planning to read it. I had sworn off WWII historical fictions after reading The Alice Network, also by Kate Quinn and The Nightingale by Kristen Hannah. Both books were great but over 400 pages each, set in France, and featured characters who were part of the resistance. I knew I wanted to read The Rose Code but I wasn't sure if I was ready to take on a 600+ WWII historical fiction just yet. Having a friend to text about it with was definitely what got me going and kept me motivated when I was starting out, but by the middle of the book I was excited to keep going.
The Rose Code is set in England and flips between two time periods (have you noticed that basically all Historical Fictions do that these days?!): 1939-1944 and November 1947 which was 3.5 years after the war ended and the month of (then) Princess Elizabeth's wedding. Luckily, the two time periods are very easily deciphered and both go in chronological order and I actually didn't mind the time travel in this story, I felt it was well done and enhanced the story rather than hindered it. The main portion of the story revolves around three women who work at Bletchley Park, a top secret, code breaking operation and share a billeting house in the unsuspecting town near by. All three women experience some ups and downs in their personal relationships, including the friendship that they form with each other.
I went into The Rose Code thinking that 600 pages would not be necessary to tell this story. My ideal book falls somewhere between 290 and 430 pages with my favourite length being about 330 (weirdly specific - I know), and I really feel that most books do not need double that length to tell a good story. One perfect example of this is The Resistance Women by Jennifer Chiaverini, also a WWII historical fiction following female resistance members (are you sensing a theme?). While I admired that Chiaverini included a thoroughly detailed description of events and probably would have made my U of M history profs proud, the book was too long, at 640 pages, I felt done before I was half way. I was pretty sure I would find this book to be similarly too long, and while there were a few moments I thought "hmm this could have been the end", the way that Quinn was able to tie so many pieces together in her final 100 pages made me agree, she may have needed the full 624 pages to weave so many interesting storylines into one.
One thing that I loved about The Rose Code that I wasn't expecting was the huge character development arc some of the characters experienced through out the approximately 8 years the story takes place. In particular, Beth, completely transforms. If I were planning a movie version of the film, choosing an actress for Beth would be tough. Despite seeming like a secondary character for almost the first half of the book, she in many ways is the star of this story.
So if you're feeling a bit tired of the classic WWII historical fiction stories flooding your shelves, this one isn't one to be scared off of. It is long, but it doesn't drag and it is not overly repetitive. There are some predictable parts but for the most part the way the story comes together holds lots of surprises. I would definitely recommend this book to fans of Historical Fiction books that have romance and some interesting history woven throughout!
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