The Voyage of Their Lives

What an impressive work is this book. It starts in 1948, by gathering together, and explaining the circumstance, of numerous people for whom WW 11 had been a prolonged wakeful nightmare, such as many readers will struggle to credit; but their stories are true. Most of the characters are assisted passengers on a chartered emigrant ship bound from the Mediterranean to Australia, but the captain and some members of the crew are included, as are escorts. The first part of the book, which I initially took to be the entire story, covers the voyage with its considerable hardships and acrimonious encounters between former enemies and suspect allies. This part alone would have been a good read, but there is much more, for the author, herself a child passenger on that ship, has done an amazing job of following up what became of many of the passengers in the subsequent decades.. At times this book reads more like a novel than a documentary, and it takes the occasional personal input from the author to remind one that these stories are true – that the people were real., the events actually happened

Very highly recommended firstly for Australians of European origin, who, or whose parents, migrated to Australia after the second world war, and secondly for all interested in the background to post-war European migration, in the difficulties faced and largely overcome by migrants in that era,or in the recent history of our country and of the people who helped to make it what it is today.

This reviewer is in the first category, having arrived as a child from Europe in the 1950s, later than the subjects of Diane Armstrong’s well-researched narrative. For me, apart from the rare opportunity to learn more of the experiences of migrants before me, the book provided memories of places, customs and events I and my parents, or my in-laws actually experienced. My in-laws actually departed for Australia on a similar unseaworthy boat from Marseilles a few months before the Derna sailed, and the privations and difficulties described in “The Voyage of Their Life” are very similar in many ways to their experiences.

The rating of 4 stars, or even 4 1/2 if it were available, is given for the amount of research undertaken by the author and for the social and historical significance of the data, which would otherwise have been lost, had Diane Armstrong not recorded it.

I first saw this book in the residence of people exhibiting their garden to the public. It looked well used and a quick thumb through aroused my interest. Having now read about half I find I cant put it down easily but the demands for my time dictate.I would suggest to all those interested in the plight of civilians caught up in world war two should read it.

Enjoyed the read. But found it difficult to keep up with all the names & families.

I enjoyed this book and felt that I knew the characters.Enjoyed the first half but not so much the second.

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