On an autumn day in 2006, on the Isle of Wight, Jack Luxton—once a Devon farmer, now the proprietor of a seaside caravan park—receives the news that his brother, Tom, not seen for years, has been killed in combat in Iraq. For Jack and his wife, Ellie, this will have unexpected, far-reaching effects. For Jack in particular it means a crucial journey: to receive his brother’s remains and to confront his most secret, troubling memories.
A hauntingly intimate, deeply compassionate story about things that touch and test our human core,Wish You Were Here also looks, inevitably, to a wider, afflicted world. Moving toward a fiercely suspenseful climax, it brilliantly transforms the stuff of headlines into heart-wrenching personal truth.
Amazon.com
Having grown up in a family with a long military history, and having experienced having a brother in the military whose life I always worried about while he was stationed overseas, I went into this novel with certain expectations. I pictured myself falling into an emotional rollercoaster of a novel, full of scenes I could easily identify with. Alas, I did not grow up with a sheep farmer turned campground owner brother with a depressed wife. So the beginning befuddled me a bit, but I tried to keep up. But ack, I just could not hold interest here. I found not one character I could latch onto and say YES! I feel you! I got no feels. No nothing. Except a headache from all the tedious prose that tried to batter me over the head with all the heavy-handed symbolism.
That kettle line I've seen a few other reviewers comment on -- "Then Ellie had gone to fill the kettle. Certain moments in life, it seemed, required the filling of a kettle. Kettles got filled every day, without a thought, several times over..." -- when I read that part myself, it stirred something in my memory that I'm still trying to fully recall. I cannot think of what the book was, but I feel almost certain I've seen that image, metaphor, whatever you want to call it -- used in a scene in another story at some point. Driving me crazy that I can't put a finger on it.
I've read a number of online reviews that in one way or another deem this book "unputdownable". Whatever they got out of it was clearly lost on me. However, I've seen rave reviews of some of other Swift's work, particularly Last Orders, Waterland, and some of his short story collections, so I'd be willing to give his stuff another go or two before dismissing him from my shelves entirely.
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