The Wine-Dark Sea

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Victoria Hislop explores the turbulence of the post-war era in Greece in this unforgettable and riveting new novel.

In the power vacuum remaining after the Second World War, a brutal civil war erupts between rival left- and right-wing factions. The conflict spirals as the country pays a bitter price in human lives and fighting soon erupts in the mountains, turning villages into battlefields and pulling ordinary women and children into the fray.

When the government soldiers come to Kalopetra, Fotini is nursing her newborn second child. She urges her daughter, Iliana, to hide with the older children as she and the other women are herded into trucks. Weeks later, soldiers return for the children. But they are not to be reunited with their mothers, a wholly different fate awaits them.

Fotini finds herself transported to a prison on the island of Chios, where she befriends Markella, whose little son, Nikos, is wise beyond his years. After months of imprisonment, when Fotini and Markella find themselves separated from one another – and from Nikos – Fotini vows to hunt not only for her own child but for Markella’s too.

The Wine-Dark Sea tells of families flung apart across continents and of a strong, determined mother who resolves not to let war destroy hers. Victoria Hislop is at the height of her storytelling powers in this compelling and thought-provoking new novel, which offers insight into a little-known chapter of Greek history.

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