The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah
“In love we find out who we want to be. In war we find out who we are.”
FRANCE, 1939. In the quiet village of Carriveau, Vianne Mauriac says goodbye to her husband, Antoine, as he heads for the Front. She doesn’t believe that the Nazis will invade France… but invade they do, in droves of marching soldiers, in caravans of trucks and tanks, in planes that fill the skies and drop bombs upon the innocent. When a German captain requisitions Vianne’s home, she and her daughter must live with the enemy or lose everything. Without food or money or hope, as danger escalates all around them, she is forced to make one impossible choice after another to keep her family alive. Vianne’s sister, Isabelle is a rebellious eighteen-year-old girl, searching for purpose with all the reckless passion of youth. While thousands of Parisians march into the unknown terrors of war, she meets Gäetan, a partisan who believes the French can fight the Nazis from within France, and she falls in love as only the young can… completely. But when he betrays her, Isabelle joins the Resistance and never looks back, risking her life time and again to save others.
The Nightingale tells the story of two sisters, separated by years and experience, by ideals, passion and circumstance, each embarking on her own dangerous path toward survival, love, and freedom in German-occupied, war-torn France - a heartbreakingly beautiful novel that celebrates the resilience of the human spirit and the durability of women.
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Back into the world of historical fiction we go! This book is unlike any WWII fiction I’ve read yet. Mostly we focus on the aftermath of the war, or how the war operated from the Russian side or the German horrors or the British victories and losses. Rarely do we focus on France. A country completely taken over by Nazis, a Paris emptied of people, French people starving as German soldiers gorge themselves on rich food, country natives being told how to live by harsh and cruel invaders. Can you imagine someone coming into your town and telling you what you can and can’t do with the punishment of infractions being death? No visiting neighbours or lingering in certain places, not being allowed a say in who enters your home or when or how often for? I don’t think I’ve ever stopped to think long enough about how terrifying it would have been for the people living in occupied territory during this time and this book did a brilliant job of portraying the unfairness and the helplessness that they must have felt in France during the war. It was slightly reminiscent of All the Light We Cannot See, especially the mass exodus from Paris, but in that book we get bits and pieces from a little girls point of view, this book digs deeper into what everyday life was like for the mothers and the children and other women left behind, the risks that were taken, the punishments doled out, and even the a short glimpse into the completely inhumane treatment at the concentration camps. It’s a heartbreaking read but worth every page. It’s such a beautiful novel.
The main focus of this story is on the two sisters who are our main characters. We bounce back and forth between both of their stories. Vianne is a meak country house wife and mother who, at the beginning of the book, seems to have endless optimism (or false hope and denial) that everything will be over in a few months (which I’m sure many thought). She tries to get by day by day and do what she’s told, keep her head down, stay out of trouble. So when her independent little sister Isabelle has to flee Paris and come stay with them she has nothing but fear of what might happen. Isabelle can’t control herself around their new invaders. She was there in the exodus from Paris where Germans dropped bombs on helpless people fleeing the city, she has seen what these people can do and she is not falling for their “listen to us and we’ll treat you fairly” way of doing things. This is where the sisters’ stories diverge and both must find their own way of surviving in the coming years, but also how to help their suffering country through this difficult time.
I really enjoyed this book, but it was a hard read sometimes. I was so frustrated with how they were treated, I couldn’t imagine actually living through it. I think the author did a really great job shedding light on some of the ways the Germans had fooled the French into thinking things were fair, into thinking the work camps were a safe place for their husbands who were prisoners of war, that shipping off women and children wasn’t a big deal, they were going to a camp, everything would be fine. All the lies that were fed and the slow realization of the horrors that were actually taking place were portrayed really well in this book. People didn’t immediately know how evil Hitler was or how cruel his Nazis could be, it was a slow dawning horror as people came to the realization of what his regime was actually capable of. I think this book portrayed that quite well. It got quite graphic at times but this author didn’t shy away from the realities of that kind of war. And she showed the struggle and turmoil the women had to go through with all of their men missing. Their war, though not at the Front, was still horrific and dangerous.
It took me a very long time to like one of the main characters, so the main holdback from me giving this book a full rating was just because of slow character growth. Vianne is not someone I could relate to for a good chunk of this book, and although she developed into a really amazing character (so continue reading even if she annoys you), It felt like a lot of that growth came from a very naive and slightly selfish place. It wasn’t until the war really affected her that she started to care about taking action. I can understand the fear and the need to protect your own, but it also felt like she was extremely naive for someone of her life experience. She’s been through a lot since she was a child yet she still turned a blind eye to a lot of horrible things. I think some of that came from denial and a need to rationalize and slowly I came over to her side but I did feel the author could have made her a bit more relatable and a little less naive to the realities in front of her. Isabelle was a fantastic character, but her love story plot seemed a bit unbelievable to me. Who falls completely in love with someone in the span of a few days to the point where they can never move on? I I didn’t buy it, so although her story and her heroism is amazing, her reasons behind much of her bravery (love) is not something I could fully buy into.
All in all it was a beautiful story and portrayal of life under occupation, the ravages of war, and the cost of heroism. Small characteristic details kept me from COMPLETELY loving this story but the plot was flawless and the writing was very poetic. It’s a great read if you’re into historical fiction. 4 stars from me.