The Liberty Scarf

More is less in this mawkish chronicle of three women’s love affairs during WWI from the authors of The Castle Keepers. It’s 1917, and Iris Braxton, a textile designer for fancy London department store Liberty & Co., longs to express herself with modern designs, but her supervisor won’t allow it. Her luck changes when combat veteran Rex Conrad takes a job at Liberty & Co. and passes along Iris’s scarf design, which features an Emily Dickinson quote, to the store’s new owner, who authorizes a test run of 25 scarves. Sparks fly between Iris and Rex, but their budding romance is disrupted when he’s recalled to the front. Meanwhile, Geneviève Tremblay is in London with the U.S. Army Signal Corps when French pilot Maxime Auvray gives her one of Iris’s scarves. Geneviève and Maxime also develop romantic feelings for each other before being separated by the war. Later, during a bombardment in France, Geneviève saves violinist Roman Allaire by binding his wound with her scarf. Afterward, Allaire forms an attachment with Belgian nurse Clara Janssens, who’s overseeing his recovery. A risible series of coincidences follow, and uninspired prose doesn’t help matters (“Though she wore gloves, it proved a weak barrier to the warmth of his fingers”). This one miss the mark. (Nov.)