I'm reviewing The Paris Library...

... a novel by Janet Skeslien Charles...

This is a dual time-line story set in Paris during the occupation and the US of the 1980s.  It is also based around the largest English-language library on the European mainland and that library is the American Library in Paris.  With a current address of rue Général Camou in the 7^th arrondissement, the library is within a 5 to 10 minute walk of the Tour Eiffel. 

But the library has an interesting story all of its own to tell.  It was established originally, in embyo form, in 1917 as part of the Library War Lending Service in order to supply books to American soldiers who were fighting in Europe during the 1914/18 war.  Once the war was over, the library was firmly established at its first address on rue d'Elysée in the 8^th in 1920.  The original stock of books being the core of the wartime lending collection.  It also took the motto 'atrum post bellum, ex libris lux'.  Very fitting when you consider this translates as after the darkness of war, the light of books.

Like a lot of other institutions, The American Library hosts and runs various events across the year - including interviews with authors.  One of those authors was Janet Skelsien Charles and I was lucky enough to get a ticket.  Obviously, I had to join the event virtually.

It was fascinating to discover how the author had researched the history of the American Library in Paris.  The detail she had discovered about the running and management of the place during the occupation and, the interesting snippets of information she had ferreted out about the actual personnel who lived through those very troubled years in the 1940s.

The result of that research was a novel based on the findings from all of that work - information picked up from actual archive documents, interviews with people who had survived the war or their relatives, insights demonstrating how a city coped with being occupied for almost 5 years.  The book was The Paris Library and I found it to be a fascinating tale.

The parallels demonstrated between the central characters in Paris and their later counterparts in the US were interesting and thought-provoking.  I thought that the two timelines were very cleverly woven together and I loved the attention to historic detail.  The day-to-day working of the library became a comforting distraction from the taught and constantly shifting tension created throughout because of the occupation and the ever increasing menace of Nazism.

I thought the charactrers were all very well drawn, although I did not warm to all of them.  It was also interesting to be able to understand how, over time, the central characters when older would make different choices or even condemn or reaffirm previous actions.  I welcomed the opportunity to consider those characters in both a modern and previous light.

A great book and I will be reading more of this author's work.