New book When the World Fell Silent confirms women have always been doing it all

Halifax-based author Donna Jones Alward’s latest work of historical fiction confirms exactly what she’s always believed: women make the world work.

Since 2006, the New York Times bestselling author has enchanted readers with romance novels that have chronicled happy endings (literally and figuratively). But her latest book, When the World Fell Silent, is her first foray into the historical-fiction genre and was inspired by the not surprising—but often hidden—fact that “women are fucking awesome.”

Set in the lead-up to, during and in the aftermath of Halifax’s most notorious disaster, the book chronicles two fictional characters (and several real ones) as they navigate the historically-accurate portrayal of 1917 Halifax and the very real role that thousands of women played in the relief efforts.

As WWI rages across the Atlantic, Nora is a lieutenant in the Canadian Army Nursing Corp. at Halifax’s Camp Hill hospital—then, a new convalescent hospital. Charlotte is a widowed mother of a young child who is forced to live with her late husband’s family that treats her like the help.

When tragedy strikes in Halifax Harbour, nothing for these two women will ever be the same again. Their paths will cross in the most unexpected way, trailing both heartbreak and joy in its wake.

“The story is really about what happens after the explosion for them, the decisions they make and how they rebuild,” says Jones Alward in a phone interview with The Coast. “Nobody was really the same after that happened.”

Through the very character-driven narrative, readers learn about the real-life extensive and integral work women did during war time and into the Halifax Explosion—especially as nurses.

Nurses at that time had to be trained before they entered the Canadian Army Corp—they couldn’t join and then get their training. They also had to be fit, healthy, unmarried and between the ages of 21 and 38. For the women who didn’t fit into that very prescriptive criteria, they still volunteered in droves to help the effort in multitudes of other important ways.

“It really shows that even though roles for women in power were so limited, they really did the majority of the caretaking work and really kept the world running,” says Jones Alward. “Men were in charge of committees like finance and housing, but it was women that were the heads of committees for things like clothing and food. They volunteered in crazy numbers.”

And they did all that while many became the head of the household, primary income earner and single parent, proving emphatically that women have been—and continue to be—heroes.

On Tuesday, Nov 5, Jones Alward will be at the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic to give a talk called Hidden Helpers: Stories of Women and Their Relief Efforts of the 1917 Halifax Explosion, beginning at 6:30pm.

Find more information on the event here.