The Diamond Eye by Kate Quinn
Wry and bookish history student Mila Pavlichenko organizes her life around her library job and her young son - but Hitler’s invasion of Russia sends her on a different path. Given a rifle and sent to join the fight, Mila must transform herself from studious girl to deadly sniper - a lethal hunter of Nazis known as Lady Death. When news of her three hundredth kill makes her a national heroine, Mila is torn from the battlefields of the eastern front and sent to America on a goodwill tour.
Still reeling from war and wounds and devastated by loss, Mila finds herself isolated and lonely in the glittering world of Washington, D.C. - until an unexpected friendship with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and an even more unexpected connection with a silent fellow sniper offer the possibility of happiness. But when an old enemy from Mila’s past joins forces with a deadly new foe lurking in the shadows, Lady Death finds herself battling her own demons and enemy bullets in the deadliest duel of her life.
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Kate Quinn is an auto-buy author for me and this book definitely lived up to expectations. I just love how she tells WWII stories from so many different points of view. We got a small glimpse into the Russian side of things in The Huntress but this book gave us a much deeper insight into the ugliness of the eastern front, the hopelessness of the War when not told from British or American perspectives, and the unique loyalty Russian citizens hold towards their country despite evil rulers. They’re loyal to the land, not the people in charge. Mila’s story was inspiring and now I’m intrigued to learn more about the real life woman who inspired this story. Kate Quinn is wonderful at making relatable characters and exposing raw grief. Normally I wouldn’t be down for that kind of depression but she does it SO WELL that I love reading it. Every Kate Quinn book breaks my heart a little bit but this one, this one kept me hopeful. It wasn’t quite as exciting as The Rose Code but that’s mainly due to personal preference, I liked the intrigue and the mystery, whereas this story follows a very detailed account of frontline battles. I learned a lot more military lingo then I thought I ever would in this book, yet those were my favourite parts of the story.
One thing I absolutely love about Quinn’s novels is that her characters don’t shy away from “modern notions”. Lots of historical fictions brush over female promiscuity as if it didn’t happen or they make it into a crime, Kate Quinn makes it into something extremely common and normal. Just because women had to hide it back then, doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. Lots of historical fiction also has a problem with normalizing pedophilia because “that’s just how it was back then” but Quinn has a marvellous way of confronting those extremely WRONG notions in a way thats respectful of the time period while still shining a spotlight on the immorality of it. Our main character in this book, Mila, got pregnant at 15 by a man in his mid-30s and a big topic of this book focuses on how negatively that affected her for the remainder of her life. I like that Quinn forces the characters in her book and her readers to confront uncomfortable truths.
The character relationships in this book were fantastic. Mila’s various relationships and the different dynamics between each person in her life was so fun to read. How hard and cold she becomes when confronted with her ex-husband, her pride when talking with her dad or her son, her girlishness when around her fiance, her complete comfortability around her partner, it was all so fascinating. It was a real glimpse into the different person one becomes when around the different people in your life.
My one complaint about this book is that, as fascinating as it was getting a glimpse into the propaganda of American war efforts and seeing the Roosevelt family up close, I was pretty bored with that whole section of the book. I felt robbed, having been ripped so harshly and quickly out of Mila’s world on the eastern front and plopped into political D.C. I feel like there was so much more that could have been explored in the Russian setting before and/or after Mila’s trip to America. I missed the initial world that was created and I would have preferred if Quinn would have brushed right over that whole plotline. But, even though I was slightly disappointed at the direction this story went, I was still intrigued. There is only so much you can change when following a true story. The characters of Mila and Kostia kept this part of the book something worth turning the pages for.
Overall, it was a great story, but Kate Quinn’s novels always are. It was different from her others in this was a lot more war focused than the other three in her WWII stories are. I love how she ties each book together within the same world with cameo appearances/mentions from other books. If anyone has read this and noticed the Kostia connection to The Huntress, hit me up because I HAVE THEORIES!! I gave it 4 stars because I loved the characters so much. If you like historical fiction and/or you’re a fan of Quinn’s, go read this book now!