Requiem for a Wren
Requiem For A Wren is a novel by Nevil Shute. It was first published in 1955 by William Heinemann Ltd. It was published in the United States under the title "The Breaking Wave". Plot summary. Alan Duncan is a lawyer, recently called to the bar in England, returning home to his wealthy parents' prosperous sheep station (ranch) in Australia. He studied as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University and fought as a pilot in World War II before being injured in action and losing both feet in an air crash. His arrival home is marred by  the apparent suicide, a few hours earlier, of his parents' housekeeper, a young Englishwoman named Jessie Proctor. Alan realises that this troubled woman must have left her personal papers hidden somewhere in the event that her suicide attempt was not successful. He searches the house and happens upon a small suitcase of letters, diaries and the woman's passport. He is appalled to learn that the woman was, in fact, Janet Prentice – a former Royal Navy Wren and the former girlfriend of his dead brother Bill, and someone for whom Alan had spent considerable time searching immediately after the war . Janet had a "lovely war" in Southern England, until the events around D-Day, when she lost Bill, her father and her dog in quick succession. Her mother also dies shortly after the war. She believes herself responsible for the deaths of seven men who may have been allies escaping in a German aeroplane. Reading through Janet's diaries, Alan learns that she came to Australia to find Bill's family, but that she still feels she must atone for the deaths of the seven men. He realizes that, after Bill's death, he and Janet came to love each  other, and ought to be the master and mistress of the family property; but now, the ghosts of Bill and Janet make it impossible for him to stay. But then he learns, as if from the ghosts, that he should "do the job for them", and there is a woman in England, also a former Wren, who he should marry.