Books Set in Europe: France and Germany

The Art of Resistance, by Justus Rosenberg (2020)

 

The author, Justus Rosenberg, was well into his 90s when his memoir was published.  He was born in 1921 in the Free City of Danzig, a semi-autonomous city-state that existed for about 20 years between 1920 and 1940.  He was immersed in both Polish and German culture.  His grandparents lived in Poland, but his parents had moved to Danzig.  They believed that the Jewish residents of Danzig would be insulated from the rise of Hitler.

 

At age 16, Rosenberg was sent to Paris to further his education.  The rest of his family remained in Danzig.  When the Germans invaded France, Rosenberg’s studies came to an end.  The blond-haired, blue-eyed Rosenburg didn’t “look Jewish” and soon found himself joining the underground resistance movement.  The fact that he was also fluent in Polish, German and English was a major asset to the underground.

 

Rosenberg recounts his imprisonments and escapes in vivid detail.  The book reads like a suspense story.  We know from the beginning, of course, that the author survives, but that doesn’t distract from the tensions of the narrative.

 

After the War, Rosenberg settled in the United States where he became a literature professor at Bard College.  He died in October 2021 at age 100.

 

4 Stars

 

Read: January 2022

 

 

Books Set in Europe; France

Code Name Hélène, by Ariel Lawhon (2020)

Code Name Hélène is a biographical novel about Nancy Grace Augusta Wake (1912 ~ 2011), the Australian woman who joined the French Resistance and later became a Special Operations Executive (SOE) during World War II.

 

She left her native country and landed in Paris in 1936, where she bluffed her way into becoming a freelance journalist for Hearst.  While in Paris, she met the wealthy French industrialist Henri Fiocca.  She played hard to get, but ultimately, they married and moved to Marseille, where Henri’s business was headquartered.

 

In 1940, Nancy convinced her husband to purchase her a truck that she used as an ambulance to transport wounded soldiers.  Soon, she found herself in the French Resistance.  She had a strong personality and became one of its lone female leaders.  She acquired many code names, including the titled Hélène, as well as a The White Mouse, the name the Nazi’s gave her.  During the War, she helped smuggle Jews out of France into Spain, she fought the Germans occupying France, and she spied for Britain.

 

This novel reads like a suspense novel.  It is not told chronologically, so it is important to note the dates at the heading of each chapter.  The story unfolds in such a remarkable manner.  In the author’s afterward, we learn that most of the events and characters in the book are real and actually happened.  I found I couldn’t put this book down.

Read: June 28, 2021

5 Stars 

Books Set in Europe: France

The Book of Lost Names, by Kristin Harmel (2020)

 

The premise of this book is interesting.  It is about forgers during World War II who created false documents to save French Jews during World War II.  Instead, the book reads like a young adult sanitized version of Nazi-occupied France.

 

Eva Traube is a 20-something young woman who lives in Paris with her parents.  Although Eva was born in France, her parents are Polish immigrants.  As the Nazi’s begin rounding up Jews, her father is arrested, but Eva and her mother escape to a small town in southern France’s “Free Zone.”  Apparently, Eva had some talent as a budding artist, thus, created some forged documents that aided in their escape.

 

Soon she become involved in an underground resistance group and begins forging documents to help young Jewish children escape into Switzerland.  Although the dialogue is stilted and unrealistic (she asks questions that, as a Jew, she should have known), she does realize that by creating new identities for these children, she is, in effect, erasing their past.  This bothers her, and she wonders how these children will be able to reunite with their parents after the war.

 

One of her collaborators in drafting forged documents is Rémy, a young Catholic.  Together, they devised an elaborate code to identify the children with both their real names and their forged names.  Eva and Rémy record these coded names in an old obscure religious text found the parish church’s library.

 

While Eva is working on these documents with Rémy, they form a budding romance.  Her mother, however, frets about this relationship because Rémy is not Jewish.  Her mother sits around and broods about her missing husband and accuses Eva of abandoning her faith.

 

As the War continues, Eva becomes involved in activities that stretch the imagination, especially considering that she appears as being very naïve.

 

This was a very quick read, and something that I could see myself enjoying when I was about 12 years old.  The characters were not fully developed and the book did not depict the actual horrors and fears of living in France during the Nazi occupation.

 

Read:  March 23, 2021

3 Stars

Books Set in Europe: Paris, France

The Room on Rue Amélie, by Kristin Harmel (2018)

The Room on Rue Amélie reads like a young adult sanitized version of Nazi occupation of Paris during World War II.

The novel focuses on Ruby Henderson Benoit, a young American woman who meets the French Marcel Benoit in a coffee shop in New York and marries him 6 months later.  They move to Paris in the late 1930s against her parent’s objections.  She is determined to become a true Parisian.  (She had learned French in school and can apparently speak a passable version of the language, albeit with an accent.)

Her marriage soon sours.  Marcel spends long hours away from their apartment and never explains his absences.  Since his character was not developed, we don’t know why Ruby fell for him in the first place, other than he was very handsome.  We do learn, however, that he is involved in the French resistance and has been hiding downed Allied pilots in a secret room in the hallway of their apartment building.  Marcel doesn’t want his wife to be involved in the Resistance, she wants to feel useful in the War effort.  She learns of the secret room and becomes involved in the escape line for downed pilots.

When the RAF pilot, Thomas, appears at her door, she falls head-over-heels in love.  The author doesn’t explain the attraction.  Why this pilot?  She harbors numerous downed soldiers.  We learn as much of some of the other soldiers as we do Thomas.

A Jewish family lives in the apartment next door.  Young Charlotte befriends Ruby.  When the French police round up Jewish families, Ruby promises Charlotte’s parents she will take care of her should anything happen.  Soon young Charlotte, who is forced to grow up very quickly, becomes involved in the resistance as well.

This was a very quick read, and something that I could see myself enjoying when I was about 12 years old.  The characters were not fully developed and the book did not depict the actual horrors and fears of living in Paris during the Nazi occupation.

Read:  July 6, 2020

3 Stars