The Officer’s Wife by Merryn Allingham I a novel based in India in late 1930 right before England went to war with Germany. India was a part of the British Empire at that time. There were rumblings of an independent India before that time At this point in the story, Ghandi had just risen to his station.
Daisy Driscoll was en route to marry an Indian Army Lieutenant whom she had met while he was on leave in London. She had contacted him to let him know that she was pregnant with his baby. On the ship, The Viceroy, she fell and lost the baby. There was no time to tell her fiancé about the miscarriage because as soon as the ship landed, she was whisked off to the church to marry her drunken groom-to-be. Her arrival in India was not all that she expected. Her new husband did not want to be married and was unaware that she was no longer with child. When he found out, he was angry. Daisy began experiencing strange and violent on her.
The cast of characters in this novel left the reader at loose ends trying to find out who was targeting Daisy and why. Daisy was left mostly alone in a new country and a hostile environment. She did not know whom to trust and this fact alone made me, the reader, enthralled with the story and the descriptions of the country of India.
I found this book to be interesting and thrilling. The undertones of racial and caste nonequity were quite evident.
I'm Hooked on Books 