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I am a historian of the Nazi occupation of France during the Second World War and the author of two books about the period. My book about the Oradour-sur-Glane massacre (Silent Village) was published in French this year, and as a result, I was interviewed live on French television. I am fascinated by history from the ground up, and I love revealing the stories of ordinary people whose contributions have been under-represented. My current PhD research focuses on the Resistance in rural French villages, interpreted through a series of micro-histories. I also adore historical fiction. I have a master's degree from Cardiff University and a BA joint Hons from the University of Exeter.
No work of fiction has had such a profound effect on historians of Occupied France as this staggeringly beautiful book. I had never read fiction like this before, a novel written contemporaneously yet showing such a depth of knowledge of the world around by a novelist who saw beauty beyond the chaos that had engulfed her world.
The young French novelist of Ukrainian-Jewish origin had planned five books yet only completed two before being killed in Auschwitz in 1942. This book contains the first two complete novels which are very different stories, but equally dramatic and written in prose that flows poetically. I loved the first novel, about the exodus from Paris in May 1940, just as much as the second, a love story that was used for the film of this heart-wrenching book.Â
In 1941, Irene Nemirovsky sat down to write a book that would convey the magnitude of what she was living through, not in terms of battles and politicians, but by evoking the domestic lives and personal trials of the ordinary citizens of France. She did not live to see her ambition fulfilled, or to know that sixty-five years later, "Suite Francaise" would be published for the first time, and hailed as a masterpiece. Set during a year that begins with France's fall to the Nazis in June 1940 and ends with Germany turning its attention to Russia, "Suite Francaise" fallsâŚ
It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.
The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to runâŚ
Iâve been fascinated by China and Chinese culture since I was a kid. I had bilingual books with Chinese characters on one page and an English translation on the other. Iâd spend hours looking for patterns to match characters to their English meaning. That process became easier once I started studying Chinese at university. Iâve since lived in Beijing and Shanghai and return to China regularly, either by plane or by book.
Written in the 1940s, this book takes readers to Hong Kong as the Japanese occupation replaced the British colony. Itâs mostly a love story in which the intensity of war reflects the passion of emotions and the restraint on actions.Â
But like all of Eileen Changâs works, itâs also beautifully written. Though the fall of Hong Kong is at the heart of the novella, Iâve always found the city less important in the story than the domestic settings. When the Bai family talks, Iâm in the room, sitting in a wingback chair, sipping green tea, and listening.
Masterful short works about passion, family, and human relationships by one of the greatest writers of 20th century China.Â
A New York Review Books Original
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â[A] giant of modern Chinese literatureâ âThe New York Times
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"With language as sharp as a knife edge, Eileen Chang cut open a huge divide in Chinese culture, between the classical patriarchy and our troubled modernity. She was one of the very few able truly to connect that divide, just as her heroines often disappeared inside it. She is the fallen angel of Chinese literature, and now, with these excellent new translations, English readers canâŚ
Growing up near Oak Ridge, Tennessee, I was aware that the city had historical significance but also that it wasnât particularly famous, at least to people from outside the region. Iâve always been drawn to these sorts of overlooked stories from history, which are, not coincidentally, often womenâs stories. Women made up the majority of workers in Oak Ridge during World War II, and for decades afterward, their stories were generally viewed as less important than male-dominated narratives of the war. But Iâve always believed that womenâs stories are no less interesting than menâs. These books look at historyâs worst conflict from unique perspectives that foreground the female experience.
Though it is set just after the war, the characters in this novel cannot escape from their memories of the Holocaust or guilt at having survived. Yet they are also stuck in a comic scenarioâthrough a complex series of events, the Jewish protagonist Herman has wound up with three âwives,â his first wife from before the war who he mistakenly assumed dead, the Polish Catholic peasant who hid him from the Nazis and he married out of gratitude, and his mistress and fellow survivor he met upon relocating to New York. The novel is both hilarious and heart-breakingâa potent reminder of the impossibility of ever leaving behind the worst horrors of this war.  Â
Almost before he knows it, Herman Broder, refugee and survivor of World War II, has three wives: Yadwiga, the Polish peasant who hid him from the Nazis; Masha , his beautiful and neurotic true love; and Tamara, his first wife, miraculously returned from the dead. Astonished by each new complication, and yet resigned to a life of evasion, Herman navigates a crowded, Yiddish New York with a sense of perpetually impending doom.
A Duke with rigid opinions, a Lady whose beliefs conflict with his, a long disputed parcel of land, a conniving neighbour, a desperate collaboration, a failure of trust, a love found despite it all.
Alexander Cavendish, Duke of Ravensworth, returned from war to find that his father and brother hadâŚ
Although I was born in Seattle after the World War II years, my parents, grandparents, and aunts spent time confined at the Minidoka site, and they very rarely talked about âcamp.â During the â80s and â90s, I worked as a newspaper journalist during the time of the movement to obtain redress, and I heard survivors of the camps talk about it for the first time. My acquired knowledge of the subject led to my first book in 1993,Baseball Saved Us. Since then, the camp experience has become like a longtime acquaintance with whom I remain in constant contact.
Among fictional versions of the World War II camp experience, this one has been cited as, thus far, âthe great camp novel.â
I consider it the âApocalypse Nowâ of camp novelsââa hallucinatory, abstract but visceral take on one familyâs Berkeley to Topaz camp journey. Early in the story, as the Japanese American mother prepares to leave her home, and with families not allowed to take their pets with them, she kills their dog with a shovel and buries it in the backyard.
Written in short, clipped sentences, the novel continues with its highly original approach to this period in history.
From the bestselling, award-winning author of The Buddha in the Attic and The Swimmers, this commanding debut novel paints a portrait of the Japanese American incarceration camps that is both a haunting evocation of a family in wartime and a resonant lesson for our times.
On a sunny day in Berkeley, California, in 1942, a woman sees a sign in a post office window, returns to her home, and matter-of-factly begins to pack her family's possessions. Like thousands of other Japanese Americans they have been reclassified, virtually overnight, as enemy aliens and are about to be uprooted from their homeâŚ
I lived in London for eighteen years and acquired an abiding affection for my nationâs capital. I wanted to write a sequel to Bluebirds and jumped at the chance of giving Bryan Hale an adventure where he could walk the streets that I knew and loved. The scars caused on the fair face of London by sticks of Nazi bombs landing in ragged lines across the streets and terraces may still be discerned from the incongruity of the buildings that have since risen to fill the gaps. London heals and thrives. Ultimately, I believe every English writer harbours an ambition to write a London novel. I did, and I did.
Weâre all familiar with wartime images of young evacuees gathered together on railway stations. But over fifty percent of children were notevacuated from British cities, and it is they that Penny Starns has studied. Once we get past the mothersâ âkeep or sendâ moral dilemma, there are the issues of discipline, education, health, food, and psychological development to consider. Starns takes these subjects chapter by chapter, relating stories of disease, poverty, criminality, and terror (including one child who spent the night in a shelter within reach of an unexploded bomb). These tales she counterpoints with examples of unexpectedly increasing emotional and physical wellbeing amongst some of the stay-behinds. This is an important record of the experiences of a demographic that war histories often ignore.
The mass evacuation of children and new and expectant mothers during the Second World War is well documented. But over fifty per cent of children were not evacuated during the War, and it is these young people who offer an unrivalled view of what life was like during the bombing raids in Britain's cities. In Blitz Families Penny Starns takes a new look at the children whose parents refused to bow to official pressure and kept their beloved children with them throughout the War. As she documents family after family which made this difficult decision, she uncovers tales of theâŚ
I wrote A Crisis Wasted precisely with the goal of changing the way government makes decisions at inflection points in history, when change is happening at a 10x scale. That was the situation between the collapse of Lehman Brothers in September 2008 and the inauguration of the new president in January 2009. I felt at the time and later that the way problems were analyzed, options created and decisions made were tragically disappointing, not because the people involved were badly motivated but because of the assumptions and convictions to which they were firmly bound before they approached the problems. I had no idea in 2019 that the next crisis would be the pandemic and only had only hope that the next Administration would include many of the same people involved in 2008-9. But as history unfolded the lessons of 2008-9, as I decoded them, applied with uncanny accuracy to the decisions made by the Biden team in 2020-21. So far at least, their ability to learn from history has served the country well.
Book 1 of these 2 is perhaps a better read because it explains, as the young Jack Kennedy famously wrote, âWhy England Slept,â and that topic is more intriguing than the tactics of the Second World War itself, treated in Book 2. Nevertheless, if you have time read both books. Youâll conclude that Kennedy (and his ghostwriter) didnât know what was up, and youâll wonder if the United States is now repeating Britainâs history as its status as a great power is put under pressure by the rise of China.
'An energetic, ambitious, provocative work by a young historian of notable gifts, which deserves a wide readership' Max Hastings, The Sunday Times
'Bold and breathtaking... I have never read a more daringly panoramic survey of the period' Jonathan Wright, Herald Scotland
The most terrible emergency in Britain's history, the Second World War required an unprecedented national effort. An exhausted country had to fight an unexpectedly long war and found itself much diminished amongst the victors. Yet the outcome of the war was nonetheless a triumph, not least for a political system that proved well adapted to the demands of aâŚ
The Duke's Christmas Redemption
by
Arietta Richmond,
A Duke who has rejected love, a Lady who dreams of a love match, an arranged marriage, a house full of secrets, a most unneighborly neighbor, a plot to destroy reputations, an unexpected love that redeems it all.
Lady Charlotte Wyndham, given in an arranged marriage to a man sheâŚ
Iâve been fascinated with historical fiction, especially the World War II era, ever since I listened to my mother playing her Big Band Records. Iâve also loved mysteries since I picked up my first Nancy Drew book. Once I discovered historical mysteries, I havenât been able to separate the two. Iâve recently expanded my interest to include the first world war. There are so many great stories that Iâm afraid Iâll never get to read them all. It was really hard to narrow down my list to five books and I hope youâll love the ones Iâve chosen for you.
I adore this entire series, and especially this third book. Maggie Hope, who started out as a typist for Winston Churchill is now a full-blown spy for MI-5 and is sent to Germany.
I love seeing Maggieâs development throughout the series. Even when faced with what seem like insurmountable odds, she doesnât give up. Maggie is the epitome of a woman working not only in a job that was likely considered âmanâs workâ but doing it splendidly.
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ⢠For fans of Jacqueline Winspear, Laurie R. King, and Anne Perry, whip-smart heroine Maggie Hope returns to embark on a clandestine mission behind enemy lines where no one can be trusted, and even the smallest indiscretion can be deadly.
World War II has finally come home to Britain, but it takes more than nightly air raids to rattle intrepid spy and expert code breaker Maggie Hope. After serving as a secret agent to protect Princess Elizabeth at Windsor Castle, Maggie is now an elite member of the Special Operations Executiveâa black ops organization designed toâŚ
Iâve been fascinated by Englandâs World War II evacuations since I was a child. Appropriately enough, I first learned of this extraordinary historical event in a story: itâs the reason the Pevensies are sent to the Professorâs house in C.S. Lewisâs The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. In the dark days of World War II, more than a million English children boarded trains, buses, and ships, to be picked up and cared for by strangers, in some cases for the duration of the war. Itâs a historical event that is as astonishing to me now as it was when I first read of it all those years ago.
Several evacuee novels published in the few decades after the war became beloved classics. Michelle Magorianâs Good Night, Mr. Tom, and Nina Bawdenâs Carrieâs War, for example, are extraordinary. But my favorite of this eraâs evacuee novels is Noel Streatfeildâs. Laura, Andy, and Tim Clark are none too happy to be sent away from their London home, so itâs a pleasant surprise when they find themselves comfortable in the care of Colonel Launcelot Stranger Stranger (not a typo⌠thatâs his name). But when the Colonel dies suddenly, the Clarks run away back to London and their mum. Itâs Streatfeildâs ever-so-dry wit that made me fall for this one, and her wry portrayal of the childrenâs experience in both the countryside and the Blitz-torn streets of London.
A thrilling and moving adventure story about evacuees in World War Two, perfect for readers of Goodnight Mister Tom
'A compelling heart-warming story about three children in the Second World War - I loved it.' Jacqueline Wilson
When war breaks out in September 1939, Laura, Andy and Tim Clark are evacuated to the countryside. The Colonel's comfortable home in Dorset is a huge contrast to their cramped terraced house in London, where their loving parents struggle to put the next meal on the table. Though unused to having children around, the Colonel proves to be a kind and generous, ifâŚ
I lived in London for eighteen years and acquired an abiding affection for my nationâs capital. I wanted to write a sequel to Bluebirds and jumped at the chance of giving Bryan Hale an adventure where he could walk the streets that I knew and loved. The scars caused on the fair face of London by sticks of Nazi bombs landing in ragged lines across the streets and terraces may still be discerned from the incongruity of the buildings that have since risen to fill the gaps. London heals and thrives. Ultimately, I believe every English writer harbours an ambition to write a London novel. I did, and I did.
Juliet Gardiner blends memoirs, official accounts, and personal experiences, many derived from Mass Observation, to present a gripping and emotive history of the Blitz and illustrate the strength and resilience of the civilians whose lives were torn apart in its indiscriminate violence. She uses eyewitness accounts to throw the horrors of total war into sharp relief. Although London absorbed the brunt of the campaign, the reader is also taken to the smouldering bombsites of Coventry, Birmingham, the south coast ports, Belfast, and other cities that the Luftwaffe ranged across, where the voices of rescue squads and fire services shine an unwavering light on the harrowing consequences of aerial bombardment for civilian populations.
From the author of 'Wartime' comes an outstanding history of the most sustained onslaught ever endured by Britain's civilian population - the Blitz.
September 1940 marked the beginning of Nazi Germany's aerial attack on civilian Britain. Lasting eight months, the Blitz was the form of warfare that had been predicted throughout the 1930s, and that the British people had feared since Neville Chamberlain's declaration that Britain was at war. Images of Britain's devastated cities are among the most iconic of the Second World War.
Yet compared with other great moments of that war - Dunkirk, the North African campaign, D-DayâŚ
This book follows the journey of a writer in search of wisdom as he narrates encounters with 12 distinguished American men over 80, including Paul Volcker, the former head of the Federal Reserve, and Denton Cooley, the worldâs most famous heart surgeon.
In these and other intimate conversations, the bookâŚ
Iâm a public health research scientist who writes humorous historical mysteries set in 1900s Los Angeles among the police matrons of the LAPD. Like you, I read. I love smart, well-researched historical fiction with strong female protagonists and a good romantic subplot. Extra points if the book is funny because studies show laughter is good for you.Â
In 1940 London, Maggie Hope, a brilliant mind who graduated top of her class, is recruited by Number 10 Downing Street to beâŚa typist. Of course. Sheâs a woman. Sheâs also a crackerjack code breaker. I think you know where this is going. The character is wonderful, the writing strong, the story tight. A highlight for me was when Maggie âa young, virginal, cerebral typeâpulls off a daring motorcycle jump with a man on the back because she has to. I donât know, I think thereâs a life lesson somewhere in there.
BARRY AWARD WINNER ⢠Heralding the arrival of a brilliant new heroine, Mr. Churchillâs Secretary captures the drama of an era of unprecedented challengeâand the greatness that rose to meet it.
âWith any luck, the adventures of red-haired super-sleuth Maggie Hope will go on forever. . . . Taut, well-plotted, and suspenseful, this is a wartime mystery to sink your teeth into.â âKate Quinn, New York Times bestselling author of The Rose Code
London, 1940. Winston Churchill has just been sworn in, war rages across the Channel, and the threat of a Blitz looms larger by the day. But noneâŚ
