Publisher: 23rd February 2021 by Hachette Australia
Pages: 488 pages
How I Read It: ARC book
Genre: historical fiction, world war II, cultural France
My Rating: 4 cups
Synopsis:
A family's love is tested when heroes-turned-criminals are forced to make the hardest decisions of their lives in this unforgettably moving story of love, resistance, and the lasting consequences of the Second World War.
After. Santa Cruz, California, 1953. Jean-Luc and Charlotte Beauchamps have left their war-torn memories of Paris behind to live a quiet life in America with their son, Sam. They have a house in the suburbs, they've learned to speak English, and they have regular get-togethers with their outgoing American neighbors. Every minute in California erases a minute of their lives before -- before the Germans invaded their French homeland and incited years of violence, hunger, and fear. But their taste of the American Dream shatters when officers from the U.N. Commission on War Crimes pull-up outside their home and bring Jean-Luc in for questioning.
Before. Paris, France, 1944. Germany has occupied France for four years. Jean-Luc works at the railway station at Bobigny, where thousands of Jews travel each day to be "resettled" in Germany. But Jean-Luc and other railway employees can't ignore the rumors or what they see on the tracks: too many people are packed into the cars, and bodies are sometimes left to be disposed of after a train departs. Jean-Luc's unease turns into full-blown panic when a young woman with bright green eyes bursts from the train one day alongside hundreds of screaming, terrified passengers, and pushes a warm, squirming bundle into his arms.
Told from alternating perspectives, While Paris Slept reflects on the power of love, loss, and the choices a mother will make to ensure the survival of her child. At once a visceral portrait of family ties and a meditation on nurture's influence over identity, this heartbreaking debut will irreversibly take hold of your heart.
My Thoughts
This is a dual time narrative, a war time historical fiction but with an enticing twist. It begins in 1953, Santa Cruz, California with Jean-Luc Beauchamp and his wife Charlotte living a peaceful life with their nine year old son Sam. The family escaped Paris toward the end of World War II. One day Jean-Luc is then confronted by two men who bring him in for questioning for certain events that occurred during the war. What are these events and how will they threaten their current peaceful lives?
The book then goes back to 1944 when Jean-Luc is a railroad worker, meets Charlotte and falls in love. They are unhappy with their personal lack of resistance to the Nazi occupation but all is thrown into disarray the day a Jewish mother places her infant son into Jean-Luc’s arms at a rail station.
‘Everyone buried their chins in their collars and hurried home. Wasn’t that collaboration? Pretending that nothing had happened?’
This is a heartbreaking story about family, love and sacrifice. Yes, there is some focus on the Holocaust horrors with it taking up to half the novel to set things up, it is to my mind, the second half of reading that is new and uniquely engaging. The focus then is more on the aftermath from the war and the events that transpired from the fallout of that fateful day. How will lives alter due to decisions that were made from that spur of the moment action, one based solely on survival?
The strength of this book lies in the heartbreaking questions it presents to its readers with really, no easy answers. This book would make a great book club selection. With narratives from multiple perspectives and a clear indication of their personal struggles and motivations, it makes for captivating reading. This is not your run-of-the-mill WWII story. This is a story about a child and the ramifications of decisions made - all through love - regarding the welfare of this child.
The first half of the book is your standard WWII historical fiction. The second half of the book is an entirely different story and it shines a light on something I am sure occurred but was rarely discussed or brought to light.
‘We all felt complicit in some way, though we never voiced it. After all, what could we do?’
This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. The quoted material may have changed in the final release.
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