I found this book rather boring after the first few chapters. Hazzard is a word-master, but talks about many foreign places that few have heard much about. The protagonist is much older than his beloved, and matters of war keep them mostly apart. Tragedies caused by war are a great influence. The book is twice as long as it needs to be, and characters are rather uninteresting, at least to me. I skimmed through much of it. Maybe I missed something, as I usually agree with the critics, but not this time.