The Ocean Between Us
Susan Wiggs
(Reviewer - Rebecca Brown)
2004 Mira Books
ISBN: 0778320359

A powerful novel pays homage to those patriotic civilians -- military wives & their marriages in time of war, their courage & commitment.

With the deployment of a US aircraft carrier in the fight against terrorism, three women are left to struggle with their duties of holding marriage, family & community together on Whidbey Island, Washington, in the heart of the Puget Sound just north of Seattle, the home to some of the largest Naval Bases on the Pacific Rim.

Aboard the USS Dominion at the end of a months-long deployment somewhere on the far side of the Pacific Ocean, Captain Steven Bennett. Deputy Commander of the Air Group, eyes the incoming emails from his children. His wife Grace is “maintaining radio silence like a wartime spy” & he knows how badly his past has caught up with him. Roaring overhead are the Prowlers & Tomcats, leaving & landing, one of them driven by Joshua Lamont, Steve's spitting image.

Then it's time he suit up the embedded reporter & her film crew to show them the ropes of a nighttime flight ops. Out on the noisy, crowded flight deck, Aviation Ordnanceman Airman Michael Rivera, loving his work, about to become a father back home, & at the tail end of a long shift, notices sparks & smoke coming from an aircraft flare dispenser, as does Steve, & together in a rush of emergency & explosion, life for these two men will never be the same.

Meanwhile, back on the homefront, all is not well with Grace Bennett, a 20 year Naval wife veteran. She's just caught sight of her fat & frumpy self in a store's changing room mirror, her children are readying for their senior year at high school, & her fortieth birthday is staring her in the face. What she must also face is that her treasured & enduring marriage is teetering on the edge of divorce. All because of her husband's sin of omission for something that happened before she even met him.

The Ocean Between Us is a powerful novel of love & lies, youth & maturity, commitment & courage, getting hurt & second chances. I was fascinated! I could not put it down! It pays homage to military wives everywhere -- those intrepid, dedicated women who will live, for the most part, alone, raising children, moving from base to base, while being the anchor to which their husbands will return ... hopefully.

Susan Wiggs writes: “I'm in awe of military wives. I went to a Navy function here in Puget Sound and met a young woman who was pregnant and had two toddlers. In the past week, she had driven a pickup truck cross-country from Florida ... moving house to a brand new area. She did this all on her own while her husband was at sea. She didn't think it was any big deal. She had what I came to think of as “the right stuff” ... [a] strength [which] comes from two sources: belief in the honor and rightness of serving one's country, and the desire to support a beloved spouse (usually a husband but that's ... changing) who is going after his dream” & in this day & age, into harm's way.

One real-life Navy wife wrote to Susan Wiggs: “...Tears came straight to my eyes. THANK YOU for writing a book about Navy wives. I myself am one and have ... WISHED someone would ... share with people how hard the life can be.”

So a womanly novel though The Ocean Between Us may be, & a well written one at that, it is also in lieu of the medals these civilian women (& men) never receive for their patriotic service rendered to our military & our country.

The Ocean Between Us rang all my bells & deserves a place in the libraries of every military base, to be read by chaplain & commander, husbands, children & wives.

www.susanwiggs.com

More from Susan Wiggs:
Home Before Dark
Enchanted Afternoon
Lightkeeper
The Charm School
Passing Through Paradise
Halfway to Heaven
The You I Never Knew
The Firebrand & many more!
(04/11/04)

Rebecca