I think I can blame all the unfolded towels and unsorted mail at my house on Duncan Barrett’s and Nuala Calvi’s tidy little history, GI Brides.

You all know that we fought a war in Europe in the 1940s, right? Our soldier boys went over to England and, when they weren’t cleaning their guns or repairing their jeeps, they dropped by the dance at the Red Cross canteen and found — English girls!

It was one of history’s most interesting chemistry experiments.

Wouldn’t your heart beat fast if cheery Yanks in uniform thronged the streets, eager for a pretty face and a good time? Wouldn’t you invite your boy home for Sunday lunch with the parents? Wouldn’t you take him sight-seeing in the English countryside (”Wow! Everything’s so ancient!”)? Wouldn’t you dream of following him to America, where everybody had cars and oil wells and movie star neighbors?

Of course, the real business of marrying an American GI was more complicated. The brides crossed the ocean on former luxury liners, painted over to a dull grey and fitted with guns. Prisoners of war down in the hold sang the songs of their German homeland. And the food! The women and children, bridled by years of rationing, gorged on the banquet. Then they laid on their floating, rocking beds, regretting it.

Barrett and Calvi follow four brides as they meet their in-laws and cope with make-do housing, “just until we can get a proper place of our own.” And then there are the husbands. They turn out to be so very human. The drama of war, the crisp soldier’s uniform hid a lot.

I wanted my to-do list to go away and leave me alone. Oh, dear, what’s Margaret going to do now? I’ll just take a peek at this next chapter.

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One of the wives was a better welder than she was a cook. But surely somebody who can repair a tank can manage a batch of Chocolate Mint Sugar Cookie Drops. They might go nicely with a cup of tea, not that these women could find proper tea here in the states.

And not that I could’ve helped them.