So many stories have arisen from the horrific events from the Second World War. But the unique and frank voice of James Lauder opens your eyes to a whole new view.

From his detailed account of how the Dieppe raid went horribly wrong to the tedium and camaraderie of a German prisoner of war camp, he resurrects a series of characters whose stories can haunt us for years to come.

He inspires you to laugh with the silly pranks and wordplay of a bored group of men.

He makes you ache for the simple human comforts that he missed while locked away overseas.

And he sickens you with the brutality of soldiers and the SS when they have the power to humiliate and hurt others during a dark time in world history.

Several of the portraits he shares stick with you:

• The beating of a Jewish woman who defies a member of the SS in public;

• The scene of a train station bombing where Germans and Canadians pulled together to save the injured;

• The hilarious misunderstanding of a daily greeting in a hallway at the camp.

From this book, you will see men at their best and their worst. There are times when you empathize with James and others when you want to slap him and his buddies up the side of the head for their racism and sexism.

They lived in different times.

Every day, they aimed to survive just one more day. They kept hoping the war would end, always in the spring to come. Even knowing when they would go home, you live in suspended animation with the group that takes care of each other and mourns each death knowing how close they all are to meeting that fate.

Some chapters of Hard Tears and Soft Laughter are hard to read. But Lauder doesn’t allow you to look away, since you never know where his memory will take you.

Lois Tuffin

Editor in chief

Peterborough This Week

November 2017