War and Remembrance
Throughout this story, Wouk focuses on the Henry family: career naval officer Victor “Pug” Henry, his wife Rhoda, and their three children: sons Warren and Byron – together with Byron’s wife Natalie and her uncle, Aaron Jastrow – and their daughter Madeline. Through their experiences, Wouk undertakes to tell nothing less than the entire story of World War II – in both Europe and the Pacific – from beginning to end, as well as the Holocaust that laid waste to European Jewry. It is a story of extraordinary scope, and while some aspects of the war are described in greater detail than others, the result is a picture of this immense conflict that feels complete.
