He hides this secret for his whole life until Charlie's execution, at which point Charlie reveals that he and the rest of the family knew this secret all along but never blamed Tommo for this because they knew it was entirely out of his control. Because Tommo believes he caused the accident that resulted in his father's death, he blames himself for it. BlameĪnother constant theme of the book is blame: both self-blame and blame from others.
Eventually, this is resolved, but then Tommo must deal with the trauma of war and the execution of Charlie, another kind of loss. Beyond the emotional consequences of losing a parent, this loss extends to practical consequences: Tommo's home was tied to his father's job, and so the loss of his father also threatens the family's ability to preserve their home. Much of Tommo's experiences, good or bad, stem from the loss of his father and the way in which he deals with that loss. Overall, the novel depicts war as violent and horrifying. The theme also deals with issues such as the irony of the War Office knowing that certain battles were lost but continuing to fight them anyway for propaganda and morale, and of the fresh recruits getting progressively younger as the number of men able to serve in the war starts to dwindle. The theme of war is illustrated by the depictions of the harshness of the war, the terror felt by the soldiers, and the decimation of a generation of young men caused by sending them off poorly equipped and with minimal training, to violence and probable death in the trenches. War is the central theme of the book and, therefore, the starting point for many of the other themes in the book. The story in the novel takes place against a background of World War One.
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