Waiting for Sunrise was a flat-out outstanding, page-turning, brilliant novel. I was riveted from the first page onward. Set against the backdrop of WWI in Vienna and London, the book follows the life of Lysander Rief, a young man who is an actor and becomes ensnared in a passionate love affair. The book then takes a sharp turn as the protagonist enters the war and becomes involved in a special mission. This book was intriguing on many levels and while I thought the parts about the war dragged on a bit, it held my interest and was quite riveting. I will definitely be reading more by William Boyd soon! It delights me to have stumbled upon a new author.
Written in 1877, Black Beauty is a tale of a horse's life told through its perspective. The author, Anna Sewell, grew up with horses and wrote the novel as a treaty to encourage people to treat horses humanely. The story reads as a memoir of Black Beauty's life and follows him from his birthplace and then from owner to owner, some of whom are kind and compassionate while others are inhumane. While the story does not have a climax, it nonetheless held my interest throughout. The book does an excellent job at conveying the importance of treating animals with kindness and compassion, and was a very easy to read and smartly written. This is a true classic!
