Book Review: The Paris Library by Janet Skeslien Charles

The Paris Library
by Janet Skeslien Charles (Skeslien Charles)

 

You may find yourself asking, “what would I have done” when you read The Paris Library by Janet Skeslien Charles. Would you go to the same lengths as these librarians did to help Jewish patrons and to protect the library’s collection, risking an uncertain end? The story depicts the survival of the American Library in Paris during World War II and the Nazi’s occupation of Paris.

 

It follows young Odile Souchet in 1939, newly employed in the periodical room. As Odile adjusts to working in the library, she also worries about her brother who enlists in the war. All too soon the Germans overrun Paris and the atrocities of war hit close to home. So when Jewish patrons are blocked from coming to the library and much of the collection is in danger of being destroyed, we discover the lengths that Odile and other librarians at the American Library in Paris will go to in order to help and provide materials to their Jewish subscribers and other international patrons.

 

The book alternates chapters, exchanging stories with teenage Lily. In 1983 in Froid, Montana, Lily mourns her mother. Lily has to learn how to live with a new family when her father remarries and she becomes a big sister, as well as how to survive her high school years. Here Odile is now a widow, Mrs. Gustafson “the War Bride,” and lives a very solitary life. She befriends teenage Lily. It starts with French lessons, but eventually Odile teaches Lily how to survive when your life is torn apart.

 

The Paris Library is fiction; however, it is based on the actual people who worked in the American Library in Paris and historical events that took place there. The author states she wrote the book to shed light on the brave librarians, and to show how the relationships we have during our lifetime make us who we are, helping or hindering those around us. I would recommend the book to anyone looking for a different perspective and who is interested in historical fiction from World War II.

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try The Last Bookshop in London by Madeline Martin or The Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly.]

[ official Janet Skeslien Charles web site (also official The Paris Library site) ]

 

Recommended by Cindy K.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Services

 

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