Historical Fiction Publishers

I’ve been reading and posting my book reviews on the book-lovers site, Goodreads. I’m supposed to read and review 20 books a year; so that the site then learns my tastes and offers suggestions. I probably won’t pay that heed since I don’t like being told what to read and enjoy discovering books on my own. But I do like the race or competition against myself to swallow up one book after another. Thus far, I’ve reviewed 9; except that I cheated and posted 2 that I read last year. Forgive my transgression, but they were sitting in my head and I wanted to share them.

It’s suggested that one share their reviews on their blog, so what that in mind, here’s my latest post.

Sarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Two parallel story lines start out equally compelling as every other chapter for the first half of Sarah’s Key is about war-torn France and Nazi death camps. At first, I found myself having difficulty putting this book down. The chapters were short, Julia’s mission clear, and Sarah’s storyline was gripping, fast-paced, and terribly tragic.

However, after Sarah’s voice ends, so does the interest for me. Upon first reading, I thought that this book would be more about Sarah and her journey through the Holocaust, focusing on her emotions, development, and grief. Rather, it was more about the life of Julia, the journalist, which I didn’t particularly care about. The modern tale quickly unravels into melodrama.  I was not interested in reading about Julia’s failed marriage and mid-life crisis and it seemed juvenile, contrived and predictable. De Rosnay ends up diluting the historical importance of a fascinating subject with a sloppy and corny romance.

It was more satisfying reading about Sarah’s life the main character of the story and the Vel d’Hiv round-up (interesting lines of investigation begging to be discovered, but left untouched) and I would have liked more on the aftermath of the war and its impact on Sarah and her family.

A simple read that had so much more potential.

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