Briony is undergoing vigorous training to become a nurse under Sister Drummond. They are preparing for a batch of soldiers to come in. Yet, when the soldiers do arrive the nurses are terrified and that day changed their whole outlook on nursing and the war. Briony for once doesn't mind taking a break on her writing and tries to focus on taking care of the men. She gets a letter from the publishing company rejecting her novel and they refuse to publish it until Paul Marshall and Lola were dead because it exposed them. She truly feels, looking back, that Paul Marshall was the one that raped Lola, not Robbie. On a day off, Briony goes to witness Lola and Paul Marshall's wedding. She has extreme ill feelings towards the two of them but her character won't allow her to act on her feelings. Briony finds and goes to Cecilia's for the first time since the accusation. Cecilia refuses to ever forgive her. Robbie walks in and the argument escalated from there. Briony said that she would formally announce that her accusations in the past were a lie.
The setting changes to London in 1999, on Briony's 77th birthday. She has been diagnosed with dementia. Briony goes back to her childhood home which is now a hotel, for a birthday celebration. That night she looks back and reflects about what she did and how her book never got published. She reveals that she never did go to Cecilia's and that her and Robbie never reunited, for they both died.
Response: To tell the truth I expected them both to die without seeing each other. Yet, the part where Briony said she went to go see them made me think I was wrong. That just made the ending suck more, was the false hope. Although the ending was not my favorite, it showed what Briony wanted to be true and showed her remorse for her actions. I think without the ending being the way that it was the book wouldn't have been as interesting and probably wouldn't be such a success. I couldn't help but kind of laugh when the book was talking about the harsh Sister Drummond. I grew up in a Catholic school and nuns don't play. Haha. Anyways, I really enjoyed the book because it was unlike anything I have ever read before and I found it enlightening, not frustrating.
