
When the World Goes Quiet
A Novel
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Narrated by:
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Jesse Vilinsky
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By:
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Gian Sardar
About this listen
In the final days of World War I, an aspiring artist’s courageous journey is just beginning in a powerful novel about love, danger, and survival by the author of Take What You Can Carry.
It’s 1918 in German-occupied Bruges, Belgium. With luck, Evelien will make it to the end of the war and be given what she was promised: a prized painting in exchange for safeguarding her employer’s possessions. Until then, Evelien knows to keep her head down and stay out of trouble. But life never goes to plan, especially in war.
A member of the Resistance approaches Evelien: steal a list of names hidden in her employer’s home. In return, she’ll get a letter from her long-missing husband, Emiel. She’d lost hope of Emiel’s survival, but the promised letter puts her certainty of his death in question. Evelien begins her mission and soon forms a friendship with a soldier who is struggling with the devastating demands of battle. Their shared passion for art deepens the bond, and Evelien faces a heart-wrenching truth: she longs for Emiel’s safe return…but not necessarily to her.
As the final days of the war loom closer, Evelien has never been in more danger. And should she survive the war’s bitter end, what choices will she make for a life beyond liberation?
©2024 by Gian Schwehr. (P)2023 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved.Critic reviews
“Most of all, the novel examines human survival, love, and loyalty in a time of war in an occupied area with a shortage of resources and denial of services by the oppressors…The inclusion of art, paintings, and other artifacts adds appeal to the story and plot. Highly recommended.”—Historical Novels Review
“Sardar paints an intimate portrait of a passionate young woman—Evelien, an aspiring artist desperate for a future beyond domestic conventions—struggling to survive the last weeks of World War 1 in occupied Bruges. When the World Goes Quiet asks us to grapple with the difficult questions of what we owe each other of duty, love, and loyalty during times of unprecedented chaos and devastation. Sardar is a master weaver of electrifying unlikely allegiances—and shining hope in the darkest places. The payoff is unexpected and satisfying.”—Yoojin Grace Wuertz, author of Everything Belongs to Us
“When the World Goes Quiet is a gripping page-turner about the moral compromises of life in a war zone, but it’s also a delicate tapestry that captures how love and art can keep us alive inside devastation. Gian Sardar always writes with great lyrical beauty and emotional acuity, and this book is no exception. I loved it.”—Janelle Brown, New York Times bestselling author of I’ll Be You and Pretty Things
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A glimpse of war
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A look back in history
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Very sweet story!
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For me the storyline and the way the characters lives intersected really stood out
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Brilliantly connected every thread of the story
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Beautiful
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Different view of WW1
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DNF because of narrator
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Story line- quality of prose - insight
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Beautifully haunting story
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