Winter Journey by Diane Armstrong is a book that I downloaded to my iPad and read. It is rare that I read books on my iPad but it was a book that was offered on the site Book Perks (which is a daily email that I get) and sounded interesting, so I decided to try it. I don't especially like reading books on my iPad and this book seems to be a good example of why. I find it very inconvenient to go back to review or read over something after the fact, and I felt like I would have gotten more out of the book if I had it in my hand. (I think this is a symptom of my age.)
Anyway, the book is based on a true incident occurring in Poland in 1941, which I am always fascinated reading about. The story centers on Halina Shore. Halina was raised in Australia, but had been born in Poland. She and her mother had left Poland when Halina was quite young. Her mother was secretive about their past and Halina had always wondered about it. Halina had become a successful, well-respected forensic dentist. After her mother died, Halina was asked to take part in an investigation in her home-town in Poland. Halina agreed to be part of the investigation and traveled to Poland. The investigation was quite controversial with the townspeople as it centered on some mass grave sites that were said to have been part of the Nazi war crimes that occurred in the town. Halina's investigation began to show that not only were men killed, as once believed, but women and children were also included in the grave sites. Not only is Halina involved in the investigation of the site, but she also began to learn some clues about her own past. And as she investigated the clues, she learned the truth about who she was.
It was a good story and I felt like it all tied together well. This was the author's debut novel and I look forward to reading more of her work. It was a mystery, tied with historical fiction, and explored well the relationships that were both past and present.
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