Come Home
David Bowman
Independently Published (2025)
ISBN: 979-8299232295
Reviewed by Heather Curran for Reader Views (09/2026)
Plaiting together multiple naratives that are strung through a single chronology, David Bowman’s historical fiction Come Home is an invitation for readers to recognize the importance of family and perseverance. The novel explores America during the first world war as people leave the rural landscape to seek the American Dream in urban settings.
The novel opens with Maude Brown (nee Price) giving birth to her third child. In a short prologue, Bowman sets the stage of the Brown family history. Starting in Chapter 2, the novel flashes backward by a decade, immersing the reader in Maude’s narrative. The daughter of a sharecropper living on Maryland’s eastern shore, Maude’s life is rife with struggle. Her mother dies when she is young and Maude must push forward to carve out a life for herself.
Starting in the third chapter, the narrative’s second and third stands intertwine with the introduction of George Brown, Maude’s future beau. George and his older brother, Jerome, will become the novel’s focal points as Bowman leads the reader through the Brown family’s lives leading up to and during World War One. Jerome heeds the call to service and enlists in the armed forces, achieving notice in boot camp, and serving in Europe. Overcoming what seemed to be his humble origins, Jerome is a man of honor and integrity and is a valued member of his platoon.
The First World War and the Spanish Influenza wreak havoc across the world, and Bowman does not shy away from either of these traumatic events. With care, he narrates the shifting tides of humanity as the Great War plays itself out and affects the course of history. And on the eastern shore, a young man’s rite of passage moves him from boy to man who will become the patriarch of his family.
Readers who enjoy historic fiction similar to All Quiet on the Western Front or Little House on the Prairie will enjoy David Bowman’s Come Home, the first in the Brown Book Series.
At a Glance: Historical fiction following a Maryland family from rural hardship through World War I and the Spanish flu, as its members pursue opportunity, endure loss, and build a future. A multigenerational story centered on family bonds, resilience, military service, and the American Dream.
Best for Readers Who Enjoy: historical fiction, World War I novels, family sagas, rural American history, wartime stories, Spanish flu fiction, coming-of-age stories, perseverance and family, early 20th-century America