Charlotte Gray - Sebastian Faulks

Doing for the 2nd World War what he did for the 1st in "Birdsong", Sebastian Faulks presents a wonderful picture of life in France during the war years. Charlotte Gray is sent to Occupied France to run an errand for an undercover special operations unit. However she has a mission of her own - to find her lover, and airman lost in action over France. She stays in France, against her orders, and settles in the small town of Lauverette whilst she tries to find information about her lover. Hiding her identity from the townspeople she suffers, along with them, at the hands of the occupying german army.She finds work and friendship with a ...  Read the complete review

Sebastian Faulks is well known as a period drama writer, focusing on wartime romance and long descriptive passages. Knowing this isn't really my thing, I thought I would give this a go. My wife and mum had both praised it, saying how well written it was, and I thought I would at least try it. I hadn't heard one person say anything negative about Faulks. It became pretty clear early on that nothing was going to happen very quickly in this book. I am the sort of person who loves a good crime thriller or a fast paced, easy to read book such as a James Patterson or Ian Rankin. What I found with Charlotte Gray was a wonderful story but one that I would have to be ...  Read the complete review

I was expecting this to be an intelligently written second world war thriller. I was surprised by the degree to which this is not in fact a thriller novel. It is however, brilliantly devised and written and very much about the second world war. The setting is largely France, dealing with French responses to the occupation - unlike the image created by 'allo allo', most people were not in the resistence, many collaborated, including the then Vichy government. In war time, people often do terrible things, and this book does not shy away from exploring the inhumanity that war encourages. The book follows the lives of a range of characters - ...  Read the complete review

I have just finished this and found this extremely moving-not the spy story I was expecting.Though I had not seen the film,all I knew about this novel before I read it was that the movie starred Cate Blanchett whom I must admit to having a minor crush on.Seeing as this had been marketed as a love story though always put me off the film version. The emphasis on the novel is less about the romance though and more an examination of events in occupied France during the second world war-the tragedy,heartache and emotions felt by it's citizens as an era of distrust evolves around them are all given the literary treatment as neighbours begin to wonder whom amongst ...  Read the complete review