Last WWII reads of 2022: book recommendations
Don’t let the title picture fool you into thinking that this is a travel blog about Paris. However, 2 out of today’s book recommendations are set (partly) in Paris, and 1 of them is about visitors and habitants of the Ritz hotel in Paris during WWI, WWII and in the 1960s. Let the Ritz hotel be at the Place Vendome, which is depicted here.
Don’t let the title picture fool you into thinking that this is a travel blog about Paris. However, 2 out of today’s book recommendations are set (partly) in Paris, and 1 of them is about visitors and habitants of the Ritz hotel in Paris during WWI, WWII and in the 1960s. Let the Ritz hotel be at the Place Vendome, which is depicted here.
This first book is “All the ways we said goodbye” by authors: Beatriz Williams, Lauren Willig, Karen White.
We start in 1964 with Babs (Barbara) Langford, who become a widow the previous year. She receives a letter from an unknown man Andrew Bowdoin asking to meet at the Ritz Hotel to see if she has more information about LaFleur. Somebody his father thinks betrayed him, and a name Babs late husband repeated multiple times in his restless dreams after returning from a German prison camp.
The second chapter introduces Aurélie, a resident of the Ritz in 1914. In the next chapter, we meet Aurélie’s daughter Daisy in 1942. Once Babs arrives in Paris she also meets Miss Precious Dubose, Mrs. Schuyler, and Margot Lemouron. During the chapters of both World Wars, we also encounter German soldier Max Von Sternburg.
Will Babs and Andrew find out who LaFleur is and what happened? And how does Max fit in all of this?
We know that Kit Langford (Babs’ late husband) survives the war as they only get married after it. Hence when we learn that he was in the French Resistance knowing what his work there was, was interesting but not suspenseful.
Some mysteries, for lack of a better word, can be easily solved before they are revealed to the reader. Nonetheless, the big question of who LaFleur is, is only revealed in one of the last chapters and was someone who I wouldn’t have suspected.
The book is well written with descriptive language that felt like you can really get the know the characters and feel like you are standing next to them.
The second book set in Paris is “The forgotten bookshop in Paris” by Daisy Wood
Juliette had a French grandmother she remembers little about. However, she has a painting from a square in Paris that belonged to her grandmother. When she goes to Paris with her husband of 25 years she not only finds the actual square but on the evening before her departure, she also finds out her husband is having an affair. So she decides to stay in Paris to think about her future. She moves into a cheap hotel near a metro station and each morning she goes to a café/restaurant on the square. When the café closes for renovations she talks to one of the regulars of the café, “husband of thérèse” (needs to look up again his name, something with A) who invites her to dinner. At this dinner, she meets 2 other friends of his, Nico and … with their partners). Nico invites her to stay at his grandmother’s apartment, also located on the square, but the apartment needs some cleaning as it is still full of the grandmother’s belongings. Grandma is alive, but living at a nursing home. When the apartment is almost cleaned out Nico recants his offer to rent out the apartment. But in the meantime, Juliette fell completely in love with the building and especially the empty shop on the ground floor. So she decides to stay in Paris and make a go at a new life there. Will she succeed in this and will she find out more about her grandmother is for you to find out?
Not based on any true events. While some of the resistance work is dangerous it isn’t really a suspense story. You wonder from time to time who can be the grandmother and if the characters from the war year survive but I didn’t find it very gripping.
For me the least favorite book of the 3, but as everybody has different tastes maybe you give it more than 3 out of 5 stars.
The last book I want to give a shout-out to in this blog is: “The things we cannot say” by Kelly Rimmer.
We have Hannah or Alina as we as a reader get to know Alice’s grandmother very soon, who has a stroke and lost her ability to speak English. She finds a way to communicate with her daughter and granddaughter through the ACC app of her grandson. Being on her deathbed she wants to know about Tomasz, who Alice and Julita always thought was their grandfather and father respectively. While Alice indeed looks a lot like the young man in the photograph Alina shows them it is not the man they grew up with. Julita thinks her mother is sending Alice on a wild goose chase. And Alice herself is not sure she can go with a son on the autism spectrum and a daughter that also needs attention, while her husband is a work-acholic.
The story switches between chapters of Alina and Alice, so for a big part between past and present. Where the past starts begins in, we see Alina grow from an innocent teenager to the grandmother she is now. Of course, these past dates are also right during world war 2 in a small village near Auschwitz. Alina’s mother and father have the foresight to stash some food away and create a “safe room” but not sure if they are just naïve about what is happening in the camps or if she just wants to protect their daughter.
While I went back and forth a few times about what happened to Tomasz and if he was Alice’s biological grandfather or not, in the end, it was quite easy to figure out. However, I didn’t expect quite this ending. For me, it was certainly a good book in its genre.
I love to make money by reading, but find the process of getting an entrepreneur number and paying taxes quite daunting. Hence, as per usual there are no affiliate links in this post. And before that happens I’m first going to try and be consistent in posting and improve the SEO rate with time.
If you want to have more of a summary of the books I review, please let me know. I try not to give too much away, but what is too much?
One Comment
Marjolein
super dat je weer publiceert! groetjes