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In Memoriam

By: Alice Winn
Narrated by: Christian Coulson
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Publisher's summary

GMA BUZZ PICK • INTERNATIONAL BEST SELLER AND AWARD WINNER • A haunting, virtuosic debut novel about two young men who fall in love during World War I • “Will live in your mind long after you’ve closed the final pages.” —Maggie O’Farrell, best-selling author of Hamnet and The Marriage Portrait

A Best Book of the Year:
The New Yorker, The Washington Post, NPR

“In Memoriam is the story of a great tragedy, but it is also a moving portrait of young love.”—The New York Times

It’s 1914, and World War I is ceaselessly churning through thousands of young men on both sides of the fight. The violence of the front feels far away to Henry Gaunt, Sidney Ellwood and the rest of their classmates, safely ensconced in their idyllic boarding school in the English countryside. News of the heroic deaths of their friends only makes the war more exciting.

Gaunt, half German, is busy fighting his own private battle—an all-consuming infatuation with his best friend, the glamorous, charming Ellwood—without a clue that Ellwood is pining for him in return. When Gaunt's family asks him to enlist to forestall the anti-German sentiment they face, Gaunt does so immediately, relieved to escape his overwhelming feelings for Ellwood. To Gaunt's horror, Ellwood rushes to join him at the front, and the rest of their classmates soon follow. Now death surrounds them in all its grim reality, often inches away, and no one knows who will be next.

An epic tale of both the devastating tragedies of war and the forbidden romance that blooms in its grip, In Memoriam is a breathtaking debut.

©2023 Alice Winn (P)2023 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

2023, Center for Fiction First Novel Prize: Long-listed

2024, VCU Cabell First Novelist Prize: Winner

A Best Book of the Year: The New Yorker, The Washington Post, NPR, BookPage, Shelf Awareness, and Spectator

"Magnificent—dazzling and wrenching, witty and wildly romantic, with echoes of Brideshead Revisited and Atonement. I loved it.” —Lev Grossman, author of The Magicians

“An epic love story amid the brutalities of war.” People

“Glorious, addictive, exquisite . . . I couldn’t put it down.” —Hugh Ryan, New York Times Book Review

What listeners say about In Memoriam

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Devastatingly Beautiful & Heartbreaking

This is now my all-time favorite novel. It is exquisitely narrated by Christian Coulson. Alice Winn is a brilliant writer and wise beyond her age. I could not recommend this audio book more. I will now purchase the novel so that I can immerse myself in all its searing beauty.

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  • Overall
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Love over war

A story of romantic love during the harshest times, World War I with all the difficulties the two main characters have to express it. the story of these two young boys who fall in love when they meet in school and continue loving each other through this tragic war shows how pointless war is as they lose their friends

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Achingly beautiful

Winn expertly mixes poetry, literature, history, and romance. Prepare to feel as if you are in the trenches.

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Truth, tragedy and beauty

An exquisite piece of literature that perfectly captures the glorious tragedy of this thing we call man, this infinitismal speck of existence fighting to create meaning and beauty within the heedless and inexorable march of events we call history.

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Amazing

This book is unbelievably fantastic.
The characters are extremely Three dimensional and you love them in spite of their faults. The history is well researched and incredibly well described. Definitely A contender for my ten favorite books list!

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Devastatingly beautiful

Against the backdrop of The Grewt War is a much quieter but deeper battle the two men at the center of this gorgeous book fight, both against themselves and each other. Winn handles it all with wit, poetry, and no small amount of brutal truth and emotion.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough.

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The historical romance

Beautiful romance with a somber but hopeful ending, a well told story that illustrates the atrocities and reality of war

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I don’t know how to feel

I loved reading it and I hated it. I don’t know how to feel about it, I need a couple days to process what I just read.

As a person who is not interested in war stories, Gaunt and Ellewood’s story will stay with me for some time, holy shit. I didn’t expect so many of their friends to die along the way. And poor Ellewood, he definitely had a harder time. I hope he can heal with Gaunt in Brazil

Be prepared for a lot of death. And sadness. But also some happiness. And for anyone who thinks Ellewood doesn’t love Gaunt anymore, clearly didn’t read close enough. I would love a sequel of them healing and growing old together, Jesus they’re only 21 in the ending.

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Riveting

Narrators were wonderful, seamless conversations and descriptions. diction and acccents genuine. History made accessible and entertaining.



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My new favorite book

I could not put this book down. It was heartbreaking in so many ways and really made me feel for the young men of the time. No one should be shamed into going to war. I think this book is so well written and well rounded.

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