Miss Violet & the Great War (Strangely Beautiful)

by Leanna Renee Hieber

From childhood, Violet Rychman has dreamed of a coming war, of death and battle on an unimaginable scale. She has seen and heard ghosts, who have loved and guided her.

Now the future she dreamed has come to pass. World War I rages across Europe. Millions of people are dying; entire villages are disappearing.

A great and terrible vision sweeps over Violet, offering powers heralded by the Muses of antiquity. The ability to impact people's memories, even shape their thoughts. To guide their souls. To pass between the world of the living and that of the dead and to bring others through that passage.

These and other gifts once belonged to people Violet loved. Now they are hers, and she must use them to attempt to stop death itself.

• ISBN10: 142851788X
• ISBN13: 9781428517882
• Publish Date: 5 June 2012 (first published 1 June 2012)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Dorchester Publishing
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 336
• Language: English

Reviews

[Quirky Cat]

I received a copy of Miss Violet & The Great War through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.

Miss Violet & The Great War is the fourth novel in the Strangely Beautiful series by Leanna Renee Hieber. The novel follows Violet Rychman and William Page as they try and balance out the lives around them with the prophecies they’ve been handed. They live in a world full of muses and gods and goddesses. It probably goes without saying that it is a chaotic world.
I’ll confess that I totally goofed when I first picked this novel up. I was so enchanted by the premise that I didn’t even notice that it wasn’t the first one in the series. It was an honest mistake, and I probably should have stopped reading it the second I realized it (spoilers and all). But honestly. I had absolutely no trouble understanding the context of the story, and thus decided to continue reading.
I’m sure I missed some of the nuances of the plot, things that referenced back to the first three novels. But despite that, I really did enjoy this read. It was a beautiful world, full of interesting characters and an even more interesting plot. Once again, I know I should have put the book down, but I couldn’t bring myself to do so. Hopefully that’ll give you a good idea of my opinion on this book.



Miss Violet & The Great War had a way of blending the old and the new, so to speak. There are elements of an older world infused into a more modern one. This made the novel feeling oddly enchanting yet chilling at the same time. I immediately fell in love with the tone alone, but my fondness for the characters and plot quickly followed.
Violet is a young girl at the beginning of the book, though that does change over time. I rather liked watching her grow up and learn to deal with her visions. The visions I’m sure would be very traumatic for most of us – visions of a great future war. How far would you go to try and prevent it? What would you do to save your loved ones from that fate? These questions kept racing through my head as I read along.
I really loved the setting for this plot as well. I don’t know if it’s the same setting as the first three novels (I will go back and read them though!), but I certainly hope so. It helped to lend so much to the tone of the story.
I certainly missed out on a lot of details and backstory from the previous books…but honestly? Leanna Renee Hieber did a brilliant job of covering the essential bits as needed. Nothing ever felt like an info-dump (a personal pet peeve of mine), but likewise I never really felt like I was lacking anything that absolutely needed to know. To me that’s the sign of a well-written sequel. It made it safe for a new reader to pick up (but again, there’s going to be spoilers for the earlier books), but it isn’t so full of backstory that it’d turn off the fans either.
I’m looking forward to going back and reading the first three novels. I may even come back and reread this novel, to see what context I missed out on. I know that if the first three are anything like this one, I’ll enjoy the read!


For more reviews, check out Quirky Cat's Fat Stacks