The Sisterhood of Ravensbruck
The Sisterhood of Ravensbruck by Lynne Olson Have you ever bought or borrowed a book only to realize that you aren’t in the mood for it? It looked appealing in […]
The Exiles Return
The Exiles Return by Elisabeth de Waal If the name Elisabeth de Waal sounds familiar, then you probably read her grandson Edmund de Waal’s book The Hare with Amber Eyes, […]
The Tattooist of Auschwitz
The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris A romance set in the concentration camps at Auschwitz-Birkenau sounds both improbable and rather insensitive, but The Tattooist of Auschwitz is neither. Based […]
Operation Mincemeat
Operation Mincemeat by Ben Macintyre The English have always appreciated, even treasured, eccentricity, and nowhere was this more evident than in the staffing of the British Secret Service during WW […]
The Sisters
The Sisters: The Saga of the Mitford Family by Mary S. Lovell I think I have written about the Mitfords before, but I cannot discuss sister biographies without reference to […]
The Improbability of Love
The Improbability of Love by Hannah Rothschild In The New York Times review of her novel The Improbability of Love, author Hannah Rothschild (yes, those Rothschilds) said, “I don’t know […]
The Cut-Out Girl
The Cut-Out Girl by Bart van Es In 2014, Bart van Es, a professor of English Literature at Oxford University, visits his father’s foster sister, Lien, in Amsterdam. Lien is […]
The Curse of Pietro Houdini
The Curse of Pietro Houdini by Derek B. Miller In the early days of the Allied invasion of Italy in WWII, 14-year-old orphan Massimo takes refuge in the Benedictine abbey […]
The Hare with Amber Eyes
The Hare with Amber Eyes, A Family’s Century of Art and Loss by Edmund de Waal Telling the story of the Ephrussis family through their exquisite collection of Japanese netsuke […]
Shanghai Diary
Shanghai Diary by Ursula Bacon For those who wanted out of Nazi Germany in the Spring of 1939, the options were limited, dangerous, and expensive. The only country who had […]