Fabulous. Similar themes of family (especially mother-daughter relationships) revenge, forgiveness, love, food, like her Chocolat and The Strawberry Thief. Otherwise a very different, realistic story of 3 kids surviving in an occupied French village in WW2. The youngest returns to the village, hiding what she knows of the truth, only to be forced to reveal her version of the story which she discovers is not quite complete… ( )

Slow starting but story is entertwining and deep. Good read

I wish they had half star ratings here. I would give it a 3.5 almost a four. It was a good book and Id recommened it to anyone. I loved the relationship with food and smells as memories. The mother daughter relationships was one I wish had been explored more. ( )

A look back at an anything but innocent childhood along the Loire in WWII. Framboise is the youngest of three children of a war widow and is involved with her older siblings in interactions with a young German soldier who charms and manipulates everyone securing information used not for the military but for personal gain. Combined with their unstable mother ruthlessly manipulated by Framboise the situation becomes entirely unstable. In the retrospective it is her nephew's journalist wife who wants to write a book about what happened whereas Framboise wants to maintain the secrets she has kept for over half a century. I felt the ending was the weakest part of story and didn't do it any favors. ( )

4/27/22