Vintage Hardcover Vespers in Vienna by Bruce Marshall, 1947

Good condition Vintage Hardcover Vespers in Vienna by Bruce Marshall first printing in 1947

Allied forces of occupation in Vienna use a nunnery as one of the headquarters.

Written shortly after World War 2, Marshall's book is a cynical read. He places the protagonists in a moody, contemplative aura. Where the main character, Colonel Nicobar, is faced with dealing with Occupied Austria and an official British policy of "rehabilitating" the Austrians. Nicobar wonders to himself and others how innocent the Austrians really were.

We see him regarding his fellow officers and the privates of the British army with a weary understanding. A reader today can also get glimpses of a time when the British Empire still existed. The British officers casually relate past times spent in India and other portions of the Empire. Also, the Great War was still in vivid memory. Many of the senior officers served in that war. Slightly jarring is how real that war was to the characters.