Reviewed by Emma Crowley
Every page is shared in secret… and a single book could cost a life.
France, 1941. Margot locks her bookshop door and slips into the cellar, where a circle of brave women gather by candlelight to read the books the Germans are burning. They are risking everything to share forbidden stories and fight back. But one seat is empty… Esther is missing, and as a Jewish woman, she is in terrible danger. Whatever happens, Margot has promised to take care of Esther’s baby, darling Isabelle…
Present day. Lucy gasps as she descends into the cellar beneath the bookshop she has inherited from her grandmother. Wooden chairs are arranged in a circle, as if the resistance book club members have just vanished. A candle sits on a saucer; a book lies open.
Still grieving her grandmother, Lucy was left a letter about the wartime book club hinting at a devastating secret. And one book is wrapped in yellowed newspaper, addressed in faded ink to a woman named Esther. Does it contain a clue about the fate of the tiny baby hidden by the book club? What really happened on that dark night when one of its members was taken by the Nazis?
And as she uncovers the bookshop’s past, will the truth force Lucy to rethink everything she thought she knew about her own family?
Many thanks to Bookouture via NetGalley for my copy of The Resistance Book Club to review and to Sharon for having my review on the blog.
The Resistance Book Club is the first of Ellie Curzon’s books to be told through the dual timeline format and it works very well especially as it is two authors writing together as one. It always surprises me that this is the case as the writing is so seamless you’d never be able to guess who wrote which parts. The story is set between occupied France in a small coastal Normandy village called Cordeval and the present day. The themes of sacrifice, courage, friendship, resistance and the power of books shine through every chapter. The plot moves effortlessly back between the past and the present although I will say for me it was the story set during the war that really caught my attention and had me eager to get back to those sections. Initially, I felt this was giving off Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie vibes, a classic book which I’m sure loads of people will remember but then I cast those feelings aside and thoroughly enjoyed the story that developed which moved along at a great pace (in the past timeline) highlighting the risks that people from all walks of life went through in order to see their country free once again.
In the present day, Lucy arrives in Cordeval to sort out her grandmothers bookshop following her recent death. She plans to get it sold as quickly as possible and return to her life as a magazine editor in London where a promotion she has dreamed of lies waiting for her. There is some recent trauma in Lucy’s life as her planned wedding to Andrew has been cancelled due to him not being as he seemed. The reader can see Lucy is deeply cut up about this. She thought she had her life all planned out and then boom it all comes crashing down in an instant. Combined with grieving for her grandmother her emotions are all over the place and the beautiful coastal village although she is drawn to it and it holds such fabulous memories from her childhood she questions whether this is where she wants to be right now. Finding a letter from her grandmother quashes her plans for a quick sale and an escape back to city life. The contents of said letter reveal that during the war her great grandmother Margot ran a secret resistance book club from the cellar of the bookshop. Members met by candlelight at night in act of defiance against Nazi occupation. There is a secret that Lucy must piece together and at the same time her grandmother wished for the story of the book club to be written.
It was obvious that Lucy swayed back and forth over what she should so. She was someone who had goals and aspirations and liked order and structure and all this throws her into a tailspin. Yet, there is a curiosity that arises within her as she digs a little deeper finding a box which contains photos and letters. She must piece the clues together in order to uncover a remarkable story. In all honesty, I found Lucy’s section of the book a bit slow and dare I say it frustrating at times. There was lots for her to get on with to get the jigsaw pieces into place but she didn’t seem always as proactive as she should have been. She finds things and then doesn’t read deeper which would have given her more hints and I wanted to shout at her come on just get on with it. It was a more relaxed and leisurely discovery for her which is what made me enjoy the past element of the story more as we were getting to the crux of things and discovering a lot more much quicker. Lucy, meets Sebastien, the chef who runs the local restaurant/accommodation. He is the grandfather of Beatrice who although in her 90’s is full of energy and life. She featured as a young girl in the war and plays a vital role throughout the book. Romance starts to come on the horizon for Lucy but I am glad she took things slowly and that this wasn’t a dominant feature as really the story of the book club, its members and their actions are what are really the standout points from this book.
Cordeval in early 1941 and the residents lives have never been the same since the Germans marched into their quaint village and transformed everything and not for the better. Despite, the large number of historical fiction set during WW2 that I have read, it never seizes to amaze/horrify me just how much people’s lives were altered by the invasion. To go from living a quiet life with no trouble to the next day being under strict rules and regulations with your movements curtailed and controlled I couldn’t fathom what it would be like. Margot runs the bookshop, whose French name translates to pages of hope and all she longs for is the life she once knew whether everything was safe and secure. She is a widow and had created a new life for herself in the village which has been shattered with the arrival of the Germans and more recently of SS Officer Felix Lauterborn whose brother Professor Theo had been living in the village for several years. Life has become full of suffering, restrictions, food shortages, curfews, intimidation, violence and evil. The charming village streets now echo with her footsteps of German soldiers, and the bar is filled with their raucous laughter on a nightly basis. Even local woman Josephine who lives above the bar has turned and become a collaborator. But Margot is a woman who knows her own mind and she is determined to do anything be it big or small that in some way can help the village see its way through its darkest hours.
I loved Margot as the main character. She could have been someone who hid away in her bookshop just do the least amount of work she had to do to get by. But she was full of kindness, determination and an indomitable spirit. Her idea of setting up a secret book club where members would read from the list of banned books was genius. It was her way of fighting back when she couldn’t physically fight. The Germans had taken away so much from them but they wouldn’t take their stories or words which are so powerful. There were various female members of the book club coming from all walks of life in the village. The names and details of each I won’t go into but one in particular Esther will prove central to the plot. For with Esther there was a lot more going on than at first meets the eye and this is the case with the village and its occupants.
A tense story full of twists and turns develops as the Germans take over their country but not their minds. To be honest there was an element of me expecting this to be literally about the book club and the books they read but there was so much more depth to it. As the layers of the story are peeled back it’s obvious there is much more at play here and as the Germans hunt for the Resistance fighter known as Le Chevalier intensifies so too do the actions of the book club. I thought Margot was fantastic in that she always threw caution to the wind and would do anything for anyone. Making sacrifices is one way of summing her up and when tragedy befalls the book club she again pushed herself to the forefront and did what she knew was right just because she knew it was for the greater good of France as whole.
Books throughout the story becomes symbols of freedom and resistance but beneath all this are acts of heroism from ordinary people doing extraordinary things when pushed to the edges of their limits all because of one mad man. There are so many discoveries which occur throughout the book and there were several times where I thought that I had guessed something and was full sure of it and was even thinking why is this being so easily resolved and then with a turn of the page I was totally wrong but delighted to have been so. That’s what a good book should do keep you guessing until the very last moment possible and that’s what happened in this case. The Resistance Book Club I feel was a bit of a departure from previous books written by Ellie Curzon in terms of setting and more in depth themes but nonetheless a very successful one in my mind. As I was reading through it I could see it as Sunday night serial on the tv or something made for Netflix. I feel this is one of the more memorable books that I have read from the author and would definitely love to see more books in this vein in the future.
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