The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah is a sweeping epic mainly set in France in the early-1940s. I had tried the ebook awhile back and couldn’t get into it. The audiobook really helped me get past that, and I am SO GLAD I did!
Author: Kristin Hannah
Publication date: 3 Feb 2015
Genre: historical fiction
Recommended for: HS, adults
Setting: Nazi-occupied Paris, France in 1940s and Oregon, USA in 1995
Themes: WWII, Nazi occupation of France, French resistance, war
Protagonist: two sisters, both French, both white; one is in her upper 20s and the other in her late-teens and early 20s
Starred reviews: Booklist and Library Journal
Pages: 593
With courage, grace, and powerful insight, bestselling author Kristin Hannah captures the epic panorama of World War II and illuminates an intimate part of history seldom seen: the women’s war.
The Nightingale tells the stories 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. It is a novel for everyone, a novel for a lifetime.
What a gorgeous and engrossing story! This is the story of two sisters, Isabelle and Vianne. They are very different and do not always get along.
Vianne is a young French mother whose husband is sent to Germany to fight for the Allies. Vianne has a young daughter, Sophie, at home with her.
Her sister Isabelle is about 10 years younger than Vianne. Outraged that the Nazis have occupied her beloved Paris, Isabelle joins the French resistance movement. While Vianne is forced to quarter a Nazi commander in her home, Isabelle risks her life every day for the resistance.
I had trouble getting into the ebook version of The Nightingale, but the audiobook (which won an Audie in 2016) pulled me right in. The narrative alternates between the two sisters, with Isabelle’s voice being defiant and proud and Vianne’s voice desperately trying to hold life together and protect her young daughter.
Both sisters take incredible risks to help other people. Both women are incredibly strong and courageous. The contrast between the two sisters’ personalities and circumstances sets up two very different experiences for women at the home front during WWII. It was not easy for anyone.
This book really got me thinking about how it must have been back then. I am reading this in 2024, so I know when the war will end. I know who wins and who loses. I know that things get better.
But the characters don’t know this. They really must have thought the world was ending at this time. Food is scarce. There is no way to heat the house. Nazi soldiers are everywhere, and they constantly ask people for their “papers” anytime someone leaves their house. Jewish neighbors – including women and young children – are ushered off to work camps or even shot dead in the streets.
And the quartering of soldiers! I know the US Constitution’s Third Amendment gives citizens protections from being required to quarter soldiers. I am so privileged to have never thought much about the Third Amendment, but WOW. How eye-opening to see how the German soldiers just came in and demanded to stay at citizens’ homes. You have complete strangers in your house – strangers who are oppressing your entire country – and now you have to cook their dinner and clean up their mess and give them a room in your house. You have to tolerate their moods, their whims, their evil desires.
This book is long, and most of it is very sad. It’s also engrossing, and once you are hooked, you will want to know the fate of the characters. There is also a mystery woman narrating the story, and from time to time, she will cut in. She is from 1995, but her identity is a well-kept secret until the very end. It kept me guessing at her identity right up until the moment she was revealed.
The two main characters are beautiful, blonde French sisters. Secondary characters include other French men, women, and children, American and British airmen, and Nazi soldiers. Members of the resistance movement are French.
