Front Lines (Front Lines, #1) in YA and Beyond

Oct 28, 2016 ✨ jami ✨ rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2016-reads, young-adult, historical-fiction

At night we cry sometimes, and if you think that just applies to the females then you have never been in combat, because everyone cries sooner or later. Everyone cries.

I feel like anyone who knows anything about my reading habits will know I love Michael Grant. I suppose we all have our authors that we read - no matter what they bring out, and Michael Grant is mine. I devoured his science fiction/horror-esque Gone series, enjoyed perhaps even more his futuristic science tale in BZRK, was rea ...more

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Dec 02, 2015 Sajda rated it really liked it

Review originally posted on my blog Across the Words

I’m a massive fan of alternate history books, and especially ones that stress girl power, so I was greatly excited to read Front Lines, which is about a version of our history where US citizens are drafted into WWII regardless of gender. This book had a fantastic range of characters and believable setting that will greatly appeal to those who enjoy historical fiction books with strong female heroines.

Front Lines follows the story of three Ameri Review originally posted on my blog Across the Words

I’m a massive fan of alternate history books, and especially ones that stress girl power, so I was greatly excited to read Front Lines, which is about a version of our history where US citizens are drafted into WWII regardless of gender. This book had a fantastic range of characters and believable setting that will greatly appeal to those who enjoy historical fiction books with strong female heroines.

Front Lines follows the story of three American women (Rio Richlin, Frangie Marr, and Rainy Schulterman) who enlist in the US Army during WWII for different reasons. Frangie perceives the war as an employment opportunity that will help her support her family. Rainy, given her Jewish background, sees it as a way to kill Germans and help save her people, and for Rio it’s a way to cope and do something unexpected. All three of these young women undergo various struggles after joining the army and have to be brave multiple times, especially in the face of people who held gender stereotypes. Reading about their determination to overcome the difficulties that they had to face as women in the army and their sense of perseverance was incredibly empowering.

Even though this an alternate history book, it doesn’t really feel like it. Michael Grant clearly did his research and builds an incredibly rich + detailed setting — in fact he has a massive bibliography at the end that shows just how much he consulted various resources. One thing that helps make the setting feel super realistic is that Michael Grant takes actual historical battles and adds in a gender twist.

Another thing that I greatly appreciated about the book is that beyond discussing how gender relations would have played out in the US Army during WWII, it also goes into intersectionality issues when it discusses race and gender. Being an African-American woman in the army comes with its own unique set of challenges and the book really explores just how tough it was for non-whites in the US Army to fit in and prove themselves.

This book is split up into three parts: part one focuses on the girls’ lives before joining the war, part 2 on their training for the war, and part three on their experiences during the war. The book did start off a bit slow and there where definitely parts that dragged, especially the training section. However, with that said, I still appreciated getting to learn a bit about the girls’ backgrounds and who they were before the war changed them. I feel like this book was more a foundation book for what it is to come and I’m excited to see how the series will continue.

Even if you’re not someone who usually reads military books, I think you will greatly enjoy this one because it’s really much more about character development and female empowerment than war battles . Fans of books such as Rites of Passage and books with a feminist focus should definitely pick this up.

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Mar 06, 2017 Heidi rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-2017

This was a solid 3.5 stars for me. It was well written and the story flowed well. I also liked the over all concept. My only issue was that at times it felt like the author was trying too hard to overly toughen up the protagonists to the point it felt a little fake to me and I never 100% got attached to any or the three main gals. Having said that, I could see why others would love this one and it was definitely worth the read

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