WW1/WW2 fiction novel recommendations?

[Zebraa]

Can anyone recommend a really good book based around ww1 or ww2, preferably a love story involved? Something quite well written...

Just been to see The Reader and LOVED it but wish I'd read it first!

A Town Like Alice

Or is it "called Alice" - my mind is mixing up Neville Shute and The Jam I think!

Sebastian Faulk's Birdsong is a bit of an obvious one.

Pat Barker's WWI trilogy (starting with Regeneration) is brilliant.

Owen Sheers' Resistance is unusual - a story set in an alternate past where Germany managed to invade mainland Britain.

All Quiet on the Western Front gives a German perspective.

Not all love stories though!

I recently re-read Kate Seredy's The Good Master and The Singing Tree - children's books but the latter is one of the most moving descriptions of the effect of the war on the family at home I've ever read. It makes me cry every time.

Charlotte Gray by Sebastian Faulks set mainly during WW2 is a love story and a whole lot more - I found it a brilliant, but quite harrowing read - the sort of book that stays in your thoughts for a long time afterwards.

Birdsong, also by the same author, is set in WW1 but has less of a love story element though another great read - I'd definitely recommend it. This and Charlotte Gray form part of a triology set mainly in France during the war years.

If you look in the book review section, you will see more about them.

Again, not love story, but entirely fits your "well written" requirement - Suite Francaise

PS Suite Francaise is WW2

For WW1, I always think the best things are the memoirs - Memoirs of a Fox Hunting Man (Sassoon), Goodbye to All That (Robert Graves), Testament of Youth (Vera Brittain) - that's got some heartbreak bits about love & loss.

Hemingway's Farewell to Arms fits your requirements.

Oh, and The English Patient (Ondaatje), another for WW2.

Elizabeth Jane Howard's Cazalet Chronicles. Fabulouso.

I second Pat Barker's regeneration trilogy - absolutely brilliant!

Hemingway is fab as Bink says.
I was really impressed too by Sarah Waters' Night Watch, infinitely better than her earlier books and very moving account of WW2 from the perspective of women in lesbian relationships.

Not sure how Hemingway would feel about being mentioned in the same breath though ...

For a long WW2 stories that are well written try Olivia Manning's Balkan Trilogy and Levant Trilogy - six books in all, with plenty of love interest! A more domestic saga, but still well writen, is Elizabeth Jane Howard's Cazalet Chronicles.
For WW1, I know that Vera Brittain's Testament of Youth isn't fiction, but it certainly has love stories amidst the horror.

'Restitution' by Eliza Graham... she is a mner too

I love War fiction,and have shelves of it.
My recommendations
WW1..Birdsong,as already mentioned,Song of Songs,by Beverley Hughesdon.Read this 20 yrs ago and loved it .Bit of a tearjerker though!Regeneration,Pat Barker.
Will browse my bookshelves for more!
WW2..
Cazalet Chronicles,Elizabeth Jane Howard
Berlin Noir Trilogy,philip Kerr
Zoo station and Silesian Station,David Downing
Winter of Spies,David Newman
The Unlikely Spy.Daniel Silva
That Summer.Andrew Grieg
Jackdaws,Ken Follett
Eye of the Needle,Ken Follett
The Eagle has Landed,Jack Higgins
The night Watch,Sarah Waters
Charlie's War,David Finnemore
Strachan's War,Laura Wilson

just finished "The Long Way Home" by Audrey Howard. WW1 and love story and stolen childhood. A reasonable read.

Just checked my shelves..
First World War..The First Casualty,Ben Elton
1921...Adam Thorpe
To add to my earlier list!

Please read Mrs Miniver - a wonderful evocation of the home front during WW2.

Skeletons at the Feast by Chris Bohjalian - German perspective and an amazing read. WW2

Sarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay. WW2

The Bronze Horseman, and Tatiana and Alexander by Paullina Simons - EPIC love stories (books 1 and 2 of a trilogy, but the 3rd isn't set in wartime, still amazing though). Set in WW2 Russia. Two of my favourite books ever. I guarantee you won't be able to put them down

What about Sophie's Choice. And The Book Thief and The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas are all set in WWII

William Boyd- Restless- absolutely brilliant.

Sibh - agree - love Sarah Waters- The Night watch.
Sebastian Faulkes- Birdsong- agree!

The first casualty is really good.

Atonement?

Fair Stood the Wind for France (or something like that)

Good Night Mr Tom (not romance and a children's book but wonderful)

The Silver Sword (children's book)

Elizabeth Elgin books - I used to read them in my late teens

Flowers in the field - Sarah Harrison

"Goodnight Mr Tom" is a superb book.

how about Private Peaceful by Michael Morpurgo? (WWI)

I second Suite Francaise. Marvellous.

Not fiction, but I think "Carve her name with Pride" - biog. of Violette Szabo is well worth a quick read.

And there are some good "teen" books - Summer of my German soldier by IIRC Bette Green, and Mischling, Second Degree by Ilse Koehn (autobiogP.