I’ve had an interest in the Channel Islands for the last couple years now. I was probably one of the few people in North America to notice when, earlier this year, Sark strode boldly into the 16th century and abolished the feudal system.
That interest is the only reason I wound up getting this book
The plot centers around an author who lives in post-World War II England. The war has been over for less than a year when she gets an odd letter from a man living on Guernsey. He lived there through the German Occupation of the islands, and tells her all about the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, a group formed on the spur-of-the-moment in order to explain to a German patrol why a group of people were wandering around after curfew. Eventually in order to keep up the charade, the group had to become an actual society, and things went from there.
This was a very sweet, entertaining little book. A quick read, as it’s entirely in the format of letters and telegrams, and therefore has lots of empty space. But it packs a lot into the space it uses. I felt like I really got to know the characters and wanted to spend more time with them.
It was also a sobbering look at a part of World War II history I’d previously been ignorant of. I had known the Germans occupied the Channel Islands, but I didn’t really know any of the details of the occupation. If it is anything like how it was shown in the book, it was a messy affair indeed.
I’ve not read anything else by these two authors, but I’m happy that I stumbled upon this book and I’ll certainly look into reading other books by them. I see on the Product Page that one of the authors died earlier this year. That adds perhaps an extra bittersweet touch to this story. Well, if she wrote anything else before that sad event, I’ll see about seeking it out and reading it, and that’s about the best compliment I can think of to give a writer.
