by Kristin Hannah,
read by Polly Stone
Wow, what an incredible book. "The Nightingale" is the code name for a member of the French Resistance during World War II, and it's also the last name (in English) for three characters in the book, Vienne Rossignol Mauriac, her younger, single sister Isabelle Rossignol, and their father Julien Rossignol. They are each part of the resistance, in different ways. Vienne's story in some ways is the most compelling, for she has to pretend to be "normal" both for the sake of her children and because of the German officers billeting in her home.
Kristin Hannah states in her author's note and a conversation in the reading group guide that she based Isabelle on a "young Belgian woman named Andrée de Jongh, who had created an escape route for downed airmen out of Nazi-occupied France" while researching the Siege of Leningrad (also in World War II) for her novel Winter Garden (which I found disappointing).
I think this book succeeds because it's all historical fiction, not a blend between that and contemporary realistic fiction as is Winter Garden. Polly Stone was an excellent reader - she has lived in France, and it shows in this audiobook, which won the 2016 Audie Award for Fiction and was a finalist for best female narrator and Audiobook of the Year.
© Amanda Pape - 2017
[The audiobook, and an e-book for reference, were both borrowed from and returned to my university library.]
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