You Are My Sunshine

by Katie Flynn

Kay Duffield's fiancé is about to leave the country, and her own duty with the WAAF is imminent when she becomes a bride. The precious few days she spends with her new husband are quickly forgotten once she starts work as a balloon operator, trained for the heavy work in order to release more men to fight. There she makes friends with shy Emily Bevan, who has left her parents' hill farm in Wales for the first time; down-to-earth Biddy Bachelor, fresh from the horrors of the Liverpool bombing, and spirited Jo Stewart, the rebel among them, whose disregard for authority looks set to land them all in trouble. The girls stay friends through good times and bad, through romantic encounters and, ultimately, tragedy.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction

450 pages, Kindle Edition

First published August 1, 2011

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.

Katie Flynn was born in Norwich and attended Norwich High School, where she was extremely happy and extremely undistinguished. Published at the tender age of eight, in Enid Blyton's Sunny Stories, she joined a Writers’ Circle as an adult, publishing short stories, articles, etc; only turning to novels in 1971 because the postal strike cut off her main source of income!
At first she wrote under several different names – Judith Saxton, Judy Turner, Lydia Balmain, Judith Arden – but her Katie Flynn books were a delight to write and proved far more popular than she had dreamed. She has now published nearly ninety novels, twenty-seven of which are Flynns. Her most recent titles are: Lost Days of Summer and Christmas Wishes.

Reviews

[Shirley Revill · Rating 5 out of 5]

Talented author. Brilliant story. Recommended.

[Sara · Rating 1 out of 5]

very put-downable I'm afraid.(which I kept doing to read other books as it simply didn't hold my attention).

[Leigh · Rating 3 out of 5]

This one had potential but it didn't grab me. Four young women from different backgrounds join the WAAF and work on flying barrage balloons a job I never realized existed but it makes sense that it does. They aren't going to let the balloons fly about willy nilly. The women are Kay, a well bred English girl with leadership potential, Jo the rebel, Emily the shy Welsh girl and Biddy just 15 on the run from the Liverpool blitz. It starts with Kay getting married and Jo and Emily heading off to surprise her. This is probably where I got lost as it felt like we were dropped into the story halfway through. It would've been better if we met each girl before the war or just as it's starting and she decides to join up it might've given me more of a connection to them. I skimmed through most of it. Jo keeps causing trouble, Kay isn't sure if she wants a promotion, her marriage which was a red flag from the start falters and I could see exactly where it was going from page one. A bit creepy Biddy who is 15-17 maybe 18 throughout the book dating men older than her but different time I guess? I just couldn't pay attention to this book which was disappointing since it looked like a good one. Oh well I'll try another of hers later and hope it's better.

[Sarah Jane · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve loved this read from beginning to end, it’s been one of my go to reads when I’m in a reading slump and still to this day it never fails to make the reading mojo comeback.
We follow the lives of the ww2 WAAF balloon girls Kay,Jo,Emily and Biddy and their crews as their new lives in the WAAF begin.

[Ro · Rating 4 out of 5]

I started this a year ago but couldn’t get further than the first few pages. But yesterday I picked it up again and found I couldn’t put it down. The only reason it’s not a five star review is that one of the main characters was not to my liking.

[Layla · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another brilliant book by Katie Flynn. Never found one of her books I don't like. 5 stars.

[Stacey Brady · Rating 1 out of 5]

Couldn't get on with it. Didn't like any of the characters and just gave up.

[Judio · Rating 2 out of 5]

This took me way too long to read.

[Ashutosh Pathak · Rating 5 out of 5]

Initially it was a tad bit dry but the chapters kept getting better, till the tragedy, of course!

[Jessica]

DNF. Pushed myself to get to page 80 but by then I knew this was not a book for me.

[ღ❀ ℭaroline ❀ღ · Rating 2 out of 5]

Although I really enjoyed the subject matter of the WWII WAAF bops (balloon operatives) I found that as the author used a lot of technical speak but didn’t explain its meaning it detracted from the story for me. The author was correct in saying that it is a WAAF trade not widely covered in WWII fiction.

The story revolves around 4 young girls - Kay, Jo, Biddy and Emily. Of all the girls Biddy despite being the youngest (underage actually) is the girl most approachable. A typical Scouser who calls a spade a spade. The main character Kay although the golden girl is the one whose story is a bit too obvious. It is obvious that she is quickly identified as officer material, but although clearly capable of it, she doesn’t want to be anything higher than a sergeant. I think her storyline would have been better if she had become an officer.

It was interesting to learn just how much freedom these balloon girls had compared to most WAAF girls and just how dangerous their job was.

Enjoyable but never came anywhere near my favourite WWII WAAF novel ‘Bluebirds.’

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

The storyline of this book about girls who become barrage balloon operators appealed to me, as this was the role of my aunt in the war and I knew next to nothing about her work. Well I certainly grasped, from the repetitive episodes, a picture of hard physical work and spartan living conditions. But somehow I did not find the book engaging - not helped by me putting it down, through boredm.) to turn to something else and it took me ages to complete it. It focused on four friends Kay (from a privileged background), Jo (the rebel), Emily (from a remote Welsh farm) and youngest Biddy, (who had seen her family in Liverpool wiped out by a bomb). Each character took centre stage at points in the story and I warmed the most to Emily and Biddy. I did not find convincing the later scenes involving Kay.

[Amy DeWolfe · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book follows Kay, Biddy, Jo and Emily, four girls from very different backgrounds who join the WAAF and work Balloon Operations.

I’ve never read Katie Flynn before and I really didn’t know anything about the Balloon Ops besides that they flew the barrage balloons during WWII. Now I feel so informed! A lot of research went into this and it shows.

I really enjoyed this book and the characters were well thought out. The only thing that bothered me was there was a lot of build up and then things were told through thoughts, if that make sense? Like if one of the girls was going on leave with her beau, it would have all the build up and then the actual part with them being together would be her reminiscing about it.

[Siân · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a somewhat bland book with very little history involved. It was interesting and definitely readable, but the over-use of romance detracted from the story itself. However, it was good enough to read and I may read it again.

[Fi · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the many vital wartime roles you don't hear much about; I learned a lot from this book

[Christina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great wartime romance