Like a very many others, Songbirds of Florence is in my Christmas shopping basket. It’s a gift for a darling Italian friend, who is far too busy this week to read my posts. I think everyone is buying this book (and it was still at number one on 14th December, so they really are) for one simple reason. Because it will make the recipient feel good. Merry Christmas!
Of course they’ll learn something as well. No one I talked to had heard of the Tuis, the kiwi women who were employed to keep the morale of their compatriot servicemen up during WW2. It’s a strange story, I was kind of expecting the women were secret agents or radio operators or something, but no. Their job was to look nice, make tea and cake, chat to the men, get them out dancing, give them a reason to look after themselves. Sort of paid flirts, in a modest way. The girls were part of the New Zealand Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps under the watchful eye of Lady Freyberg, and they took their personal grooming and chatting duties seriously. I am sure the psychological impact of having a kind woman to talk to was enormously beneficial to these men. The stories they unburdened onto the women often came straight from the front, fuelled by trauma. They must have been harrowing for the women who were not trained counsellors and may have come from sheltered backgrounds, and especially so for those who had friends and family involved in the fighting.
The Tuis were based in the New Zealand clubs, first in Cairo and then in three separate locations as the war moved across Italy. In Songbirds we are invited into the lives of two of the Tuis, room-mates and pals, and meet the men they befriend, the situations they encounter.
The war is mostly one step removed. There is one near miss, and of course the repercussions of the fighting hits the Tuis powerfully as the roll call of dead friends increases. But more, the story is about how the girls grow into their roles and develop a style of independence they would never have found in their domestic lives at home. For these women their war effort is quite the adventure.
Olivia Spooner’s first historical fiction book, The Girl From London is another book I’d recommend as a Christmas gift; both are great ways to introduce readers to marginalised (women’s) stories in our history. There you go,there’s two for your basket.
Cristina Sanders' blog 