Elizabeth Letts is a formidably talented author. Her credits include Finding Dorothy, which is one of my favorites, along with the excellent biography, The Ride of Her Life. Now she’s written a story set in Morocco and France during World War I, Fallen for France, and it does not disappoint.

My thanks go to NetGalley and Ballantine Books for the review copy. This book is for sale now.

There are three protagonists in this story, and they are connected by a beautiful Arabian horse that each of them cares for in turn, each considering themselves to be its rightful owner and protector. Ultimately it is the horse that draws the three together.

Beddou is a child that is apprenticed at an early age; once he leaves home, his master turns out to be cruel and unprincipled, but along the way, Beddou finds the Arabian mare and it becomes his reason for living. Later, it is stolen by a soldier and becomes a war horse; Beddou continues to search for it.

Estelle is a young woman whose parents have died, and she is left to care for her disabled brother. One day she finds the mare near her home in a distressed condition, and she vows to care for it, too. Eventually, however, the war claims both her brother and the horse, and her story throughout almost all of the book is her quest to find them.

Thomas is an Englishman who serves as a veterinarian during the war. He meets Estelle, and he encounters the horse as well. And so, it is through the horse that these main characters are woven together, finally connecting at the book’s conclusion.

This is not an easy read or a simple one; there are a lot of details and moving parts. Because I was running late, I used multiple formats to read it, using both the digital review copy and the audio version that I checked out at my local library. The narrator does a find job with it, but because it is so complex, I found that I needed to refer to the digital copy often just to see where I was and what the heck was going on. Hardcore audiobook lovers will likely find their way through this excellent tale just fine, but for those like me that are primarily oriented toward the written word, I recommend the digital or bound copy over the audio, unless you choose to combine them, as I did.

Before closing, I would like to commend the author for her choice of setting. Those of us in the United States read an awful lot of books set in some part of our own country, with other English-speaking countries a distant second and the rest of the world seen dimly and infrequently.

For those ready to devote the time and attention to this outstanding novel, it is highly recommended.