Historical Fiction War Ii

As bombs fall across Europe, fourteen-year-old Lien Vinke fears that the reality of war is inescapable. Though she lives a quiet life with her mother and older sister, Elif, in their small town of Haarlem, they are no strangers to heartache, having recently suffered an immeasurable loss. And when the Nazis invade the Netherlands, joining the Dutch resistance with Elif offers just the atonement Lien craves.

The year 1941: Andrew Troost, heir to generations of naval tradition, has just been made admiral, when reports fly in of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Troost's son, Warren, has followed in his footsteps and is one of the men fighting for his country on a PT boat in the Pacific. In New York City, Tony Trapasso hears the call to action and gets ready to join the naval action. With him is Jacob Miller, a young man choosing to become a naval pilot instead of following the rabbinical calling of his Jewish forebears.

After renowned fashion designer Cressida Westcott loses both her home and her design house in the London Blitz, she has nowhere to go but the family manor house she fled decades ago. Praying that her niece and nephew will be more hospitable than her brother had been, she arrives with nothing but the clothes she stands in, at a loss as to how to rebuild her business while staying in a quaint country village.

July, 1940. Blitz-ridden London: Marnie Fern’s life is torn apart when her grandfather is killed in an air raid. But once she discovers that he’d been working undercover as a radio operative – or pianist – for the Dutch resistance, Marnie knows she must complete his mission – no matter the cost. Nazi-occupied Amsterdam: At the other end of the wireless, fellow pianist Corrie Bakker is caught in a dangerous game of cat-and-mouse as she desperately tries to keep her loved ones out of the line of fire – even if it means sacrificing herself.

All her life, Zofia has found comfort in two things during times of hardship: books and her best friend, Janina. But no one could have imagined the horrors of the Nazi occupation in Warsaw. As the bombs rain down and Hitler’s forces loot and destroy the city, Zofia finds that now books are also in need of saving. With the death count rising and persecution intensifying, Zofia jumps to action to save her friend and salvage whatever books she can from the wreckage, hiding them away, and even starting a clandestine book club.

Dashing and well-connected, Lanny Budd has earned the trust of the Nazi high command. To Adolf Hitler and his inner circle, the American art dealer is a “true believer” committed to their Fascist cause. But Lanny is actually a secret agent serving as President Franklin Roosevelt’s eyes and ears in Germany. When he learns of the Führer’s plans for conquest, Lanny’s dire warnings to Neville Chamberlain and other reluctant European leaders fall on deaf ears.

World War II London: When Victoire “Paddy” Bennett first walks into the Admiralty’s Room 39, home to the Intelligence Division, all the bright and lively young woman expects is a secretarial position to the charismatic Commander Ian Fleming. But soon her job is so much more, and when Fleming proposes a daring plot to deceive the Germans about Allied invasion plans he requests the newlywed Paddy's help. She jumps at the chance to work as an agent in the field, even after the operation begins to affect her marriage. But could doing her duty for King and country come at too great a cost?

It is autumn 1941, and a German U-boat commander and his crew set out on yet another hazardous patrol in the Battle of the Atlantic. Over the coming weeks they must brave the stormy waters of the Atlantic in their mission to seek out and destroy British supply ships. But the tide is beginning to turn against the Germans in the war for the North Atlantic. Their targets now travel in convoys, fiercely guarded by Royal Navy destroyers, and when contact is finally made the hunters rapidly become the hunted.

London, 1940. Emmeline Lake is Doing Her Bit for the war effort, volunteering as a telephone operator with the Auxiliary Fire Services. When Emmy sees an advertisement for a job at the London Evening Chronicle, her dreams of becoming a Lady War Correspondent suddenly seem achievable. But the job turns out to be working as a typist for the fierce and renowned advice columnist Henrietta Bird. Emmy is disappointed but gamely bucks up and buckles down.

G.W. Pabst, one of cinema’s greatest directors of the 20th century, was filming in France when the Nazis seized power. To escape the horrors of the new and unrecognizable Germany, he fled to Hollywood. But now, under the blinding California sun, the world-famous director suddenly looks like a nobody. Not even Greta Garbo, the Hollywood actress whom he made famous, can help him. When he receives word that his elderly mother is ill, he finds himself back in his homeland of Austria, which is now called Ostmark.

In this expansive, rich, and deeply tragic portrait of a German family from 1899 to 1945, Len Deighton brilliantly weaves a portrait of the fortunes of two sons, and a nation, over half a century.

1940. With the Germans about to enter Paris, Claire Bouchard flees France for England. Two years later she is recruited by the Special Operations Executive and sent back into occupied France to work alongside the Resistance. Working undercover as a teacher in Brittany, Claire accidentally befriends the wife of the German Commandant of Rennes, and the blossoming friendship is about to become a dangerous mission. Claire begins a double life as a Gestapo Commandant’s mistress to retrieve information, but ghosts from her past make the deception more painful than she could have imagined.

A daring mission in the depths of the Norwegian forest awaits Commander Tony Romella in the fall of 1942. Tasked by the British Special Operations Executive to gather intelligence relative to Hitler's race for a secret weapon, Tony leads a team of radio intelligence operators on a harrowing Top Secret mission. But the return trip to London proves just as dangerous as the mission itself. Tony quickly finds that being back in London does not guarantee safety, and soon he is entangled in the search for dangerous spies operating in the heart of the Allies' intelligence community.

Germany, 1944. Gazing through the barbed wire, Antonia makes a vow: She will not let her family die in this camp. She will find a way for them to escape, even if it costs her own life. The Nazis have taken everything from her, but they can never take away her courage.... Would you go into a prison camp if there was a chance to save your family? When resistance fighter Antonia’s beloved sister and her children are taken by the Nazis, she knows what she must do. Only she is strong enough to save the family who have been her whole world since she was separated from her true love, Viktor

Amsterdam, 1941. German forces have invaded Amsterdam. As the tension in the city increases, the Dutch Resistance is born. Tormented by what is happening in his city, Christiaan joins the Resistance. He risks everything to shield the oppressed and fight for the freedom of his beloved nation. His brother—Floris—is ruthless and driven to succeed. Promoted to the Bureau of Jewish Affairs, he becomes instrumental in hunting Jews to transport them to the Nazi death camps.

Dans un climat de méfiance, Alice vit des jours moroses alors que se profile à l’horizon la fermeture du laboratoire, et donc la fin de l’emploi qui justifie sa présence en ville. Pire encore : sa grande amie Deborah repart dans sa famille et Frédéric Lucas, dont elle est tombée follement amoureuse, disparaît. S'est-il enfui? Et si oui, pourquoi?

For fans of The Rose Code and The Paris Library, The Librarian of Burned Books is a captivating WWII-era novel about the intertwined fates of three women who believe in the power of books to triumph over the very darkest moments of war.

Elise Sontag is a typical Iowa 14-year-old in 1943 - aware of the war but distanced from its reach. Then her father, a legal US resident for nearly two decades, is suddenly arrested on suspicion of being a Nazi sympathizer. The family is sent to an internment camp in Texas, where behind the armed guards and barbed wire, Elise feels stripped of everything beloved and familiar, including her own identity. The only thing that makes the camp bearable is meeting fellow internee Mariko Inoue, a Japanese-American teen from Los Angeles.

Northern England, 2010. After a tragic accident upends her life, Kate Mercer leaves London to work at an old guest house near the Scottish border, where she hopes to find a fresh start and heal from her loss. When she arrives, she begins to unravel the truth about her past, but discovers the mysterious elderly proprietor is harbouring her own secrets…

After being rescued as infants from a sinking ocean liner in 1914, Marian and Jamie Graves are raised by their dissolute uncle in Missoula, Montana. There—after encountering a pair of barnstorming pilots passing through town in beat-up biplanes—Marian commences her lifelong love affair with flight. At fourteen she drops out of school and finds an unexpected and dangerous patron in a wealthy bootlegger who provides a plane and subsidizes her lessons, an arrangement that will haunt her for the rest of her life, even as it allows her to fulfill her destiny: circumnavigating the globe.