Suite Française by Irene Nemirovsky
"Suite Française (French; "The French Suite") is the title of a planned sequence of five novels by Irène Némirovsky, a French writer of Ukrainian-Jewish origin. In July 1942, having just completed the first two of the series, Némirovsky was arrested as a Jew and detained at Pithiviers and then Auschwitz, where she died. The notebook containing the two novels was preserved by her daughters but not examined until 1998. They were published in a single volume entitled Suite Française in 2004."
-This quote brought to you by the most reliable, Wikipedia.
As you may have noticed, summer is here.
I was all gung-ho when the end of June arrived, and then July hit. There was little I could do to assist the progress of my challenge.
When one is too busy with friends to read, that is not necessarily a bad thing. Oma would be proud of my socialness.
I greatly enjoyed spending time with this novel. It was hard to read a lot in one sitting, as I was constantly on the move, but I rather loved traveling through France with the characters.
As Wikipedia kindly described, this novel is just two of the, potentially, five novels. The first series is called Storm in June which follows the lives of different families from varying social classes, fleeing Paris after hearing news of an invasion from Germany. It was interesting to see that even though there was a war going on, social class was still a major part of life. It could determine whether or not you have a place to stay, have food to eat or are even able to escape the impending invasion at all.
We are faced with every day situations, "have we packed all the linen?", "is the silver in the trunk?"; amid the people who are more concerned about saving their lives, and the lives of their family members, than saving their valuables.
Some people made it out of Paris before the invasion, some left and then returned after not reaching their destination, only to find Paris untouched and rather empty.
The second series is called Dolce which is centered around the lives of different classes of people who live in the same town. The series starts with an occupation by a troop of German soldiers.
At first all the residents of the town do not appreciate anything that involves the German's. Slowly, certain groups start to become more comfortable with their new arrangements.
The children are the first to be welcoming to the troops, followed by the ladies who are excited about the presence of men who aren't from their town. I rather enjoyed the opinions of the townsfolk regarding the mannerisms and traditions of the German's. Although many people grew very comfortable with the German soldiers, they could always take a moment to harshly judge the German way of life; therefore, proclaiming the correctness which is the French way.
These series' were wonderfully helpful in portraying what life was like to be running from dangers and what it was like to be held hostage in your own hometown. There was quite a large amount of seriousness to the tales, but there was also an appropriate amount of humour, which is always welcome.
If you happen to be looking for a novel which was originally written in a different language, look no further, I have found one for you! But really, read it. There is history, war, romance, humour and even a bit of suspensefullness. In other words, there is something for everyone!
Travelers, start your packing! this is t-bear signing off
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