Tag: Reviews

#BlogTour #BookReview The Paris Network by Siobhan Curham @bookouture

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The-Paris-Network---Blog-TourWelcome to today’s stop on the blog tour for The Paris Network by Siobhan Curham which is published today in paperback and as an ebook.  My thanks to Sarah Hardy for inviting me to take part in the tour and to Bookouture for my digital review copy via NetGalley. Do check out the posts by my tour buddies for today, Sharon and Emma at Shaz’s Book Blog, Nat at Nat’s Bookish Corner and Julie at Bookish Jottings.

The Paris NetworkAbout the Book

Paris, 1940: He pressed the tattered book into her hands. ‘You must go to the café and ask at the counter for Pierre Duras. Tell him that I sent you. Tell him you’re there to save the people of France.’

Sliding the coded message in between the crisp pages of the hardback novel, bookstore owner Laurence slips out into the cold night to meet her resistance contact, pulling her woollen beret down further over her face. The silence of the night is suddenly shattered by an Allied plane rushing overhead, its tail aflame, heading down towards the forest. Her every nerve stands on end. She must try to rescue the pilot.

But straying from her mission isn’t part of the plan, and if she is discovered it won’t only be her life at risk…

America, years later: When Jeanne uncovers a dusty old box in her father’s garage, her world as she knows it is turned upside down. She has inherited a bookstore in a tiny French village just outside of Paris from a mysterious woman named Laurence.

Travelling to France to search for answers about the woman her father has kept a secret for years, Jeanne finds the store tucked away in a corner of the cobbled main square. Boarded up, it is in complete disrepair. Inside, she finds a tiny silver pendant hidden beneath the blackened, scorched floorboards.

As Jeanne pieces together Laurence’s incredible story, she discovers a woman whose bravery knew no bounds. But will the truth about who Laurence really is shatter Jeanne’s heart, or change her future?

Format: Paperback (414 pages)           Publisher: Bookouture
Publication date: 15th February 2022 Genre: Historical Fiction

Find The Paris Network on Goodreads

Purchase links
Hive | Amazon UK
Links provided for convenience only, not as part of an affiliate programme

My Review

I was first introduced to the writing of Siobhan Curham when I read Beyond This Broken Sky in April 2021. Like the earlier book, The Paris Network alternates between two timelines. The first, set in 1993, concerns Jeanne who, following the death of her mother, discovers that her father has a secret in his past, one that directly affects her.  The second is set in wartime France in which the reader witnesses the events following the occupation of France by the Nazis through the eyes of Laurence, owner of a bookshop called The Book Dispensary.

I confess I wasn’t completely won over by the dual timeline structure. Perhaps because Laurence’s story was so powerful or because it was written in the first person, the sections concerning Jeanne felt very much secondary and I found myself eager to immerse myself again in Laurence’s story.

In her author’s note, Siobhan describes how her discovery of the important role books played during the German occupation of France inspired the writing of The Paris Network. As a booklover myself, this was an aspect of the book I really enjoyed. I loved the idea of Laurence dispensing literary ‘prescriptions’ to her customers in the form of books, or more often poems, individually tailored to their circumstances; to provide comfort, inspiration or solace. It’s just one way the author demonstrates the essential role that books play in Laurence’s life. They also provide her with sustenance through dark times. In fact, at one point she says, ‘Today for lunch I am dining on an appetiser of Little Women before a hearty feast of Flaubert’. This is all the more poignant given the food shortages the people of Laurence’s village experience as the German stranglehold on the population increases.

Books also become a form of resistance as Laurence creates a book club who read works of literature banned by the Nazis, including those illicitly published by the Resistance movement. (A list of the poems and books that feature can be found at the end of the book.) But Laurence is also inspired by General de Gaulle’s rallying call to the people of France to carry out other acts of resistance: secretly listening to BBC radio broadcasts even though radios are banned, painting V for victory signs or the word ‘Liberty’ on buildings, carrying coded messages and delivering leaflets for the Resistance or defying petty rules such as the ban on drinking wine on Sundays or the wearing of trousers by women.

However, acts of resistance have consequences and German reprisals for acts of sabotage or in defiance of rules are increasingly swift and savage, as Laurence discovers. Wartime relationships often form quickly and can be fleeting. Such is the case for Laurence. Facing a heartbreaking choice, she has to channel all the strength and courage of her heroine Joan of Arc.  As Jeanne and her father Wendell put together the final pieces of Laurence’s story, I was reminded of a famous quotation from Charles Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities.

In three words: Emotional, dramatic, absorbing

Try something similar: Resistance by Eilidh McGinness

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Siobhan Curham Author PhotoAbout the Author

Siobhan Curham is an award-winning author, ghost writer, editor and writing coach. She has also written for many newspapers, magazines and websites, including The Guardian, Breathe magazine, Cosmopolitan, Writers’ Forum, DatingAdvice.com, and Spirit & Destiny. Siobhan has been a guest on various radio and TV shows, including Woman’s Hour, BBC News, GMTV and BBC Breakfast. And she has spoken at businesses, schools, universities and literary festivals around the world, including the BBC, Hay Festival, Cheltenham Festival, Bath Festival, Ilkley Festival, London Book Fair and Sharjah Reading Festival.

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10 Reasons To Love Katy Moran’s Regency Romances

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Katy MoranI’m delighted to be joining other book bloggers in celebrating the gorgeous new paperback editions of Katy Moran’s historical romance series – Game of Hearts, Wicked by Design and Scandalous Alchemy – published by Head of Zeus on 3rd February 2022. My thanks to Amy at Head of Zeus for inviting me to take part.

I’ve read all three books and can heartily recommend their combination of exciting adventure and delicious romance. In case you need further encouragement, here are ten reasons I loved the books:

1) The imaginative premise that the Duke of Wellington was defeated, not victorious, at the Battle of Waterloo and that this defeat resulted in the removal of the English Royal Family and the occupation of England by the French.

2) Hester Harewood, the spirited, resourceful and fearless heroine of the first book (originally published as False Lights) who finds herself alone and defenceless following the dramatic events of the book’s opening scenes.

3) The Earl of Lamorna (or Crow to his friends), the troubled, brooding and sultry hero – ‘sailor, soldier, spy, tattooed ployglot, expert liar’ – haunted by traumatic memories of the sights he witnessed and his own actions on the battlefield.

4) The crackling sexual tension between Hester and Crow, not surprising considering the references to the latter’s precise knowledge of how to leave a woman ‘in his power and wanting more’.

5) Kit Helford, Crow’s younger brother, who has a habit of getting himself into scrapes but also a way with the ladies that definitely runs in the family.

6) The settings which include the Scilly Isles, the rugged coast of Cornwall (ideal for those pining the absence of Ross and Demelza Poldark from their lives), the French city of Fontainbleau and the salons of St. Petersburg.

7) The storylines encompassing personal and political intrigue, betrayal and revenge plus a generous helping of spice. Georgette Heyer meets John le Carré, if you will.

8) The luscious period detail of food, clothing and interior decor such as this description of the preparations for a post-hunt picnic at Fontainebleau. ‘Hot-house peaches and necatarines were piled in shining pewter, and preserved Seville oranges arranged in honeyed slices on platters of chinaware. There were great heaps of glistening pastries too, sugar-dusted and dotted with caramelised nuts, covered for now with muslin cloths. Not far away, a quartet of violins and a harpist practised unfashionable Beethoven with bored competence.’ 

9) The vividly depicted action scenes – hand-to-hand combat, unexpected ambushes and hair-raising escapes under cover of darkness that make the books race along like a golden Turkoman mare galloping across the steppes.

10) A bonus for Crow fans – ‘He’d crouched at the water’s edge to shave himself with a cut-throat razor, stripped to the waist, revealing the extraordinary collection of tattoos on his back, writhing blue-black patterns that ran from shoulder to shoulder, from neck to lower spine.’ Sold to the reader over there having a hot flush…

Katy MoranAny one of the books would make the perfect Valentine’s Day read so, go on, treat yourself.

Purchase from your favourite bookseller via the following links

Game of Hearts
Wicked by Design
Scandalous Alchemy

About the Author

Katy MoranKaty Moran is the author of Game of Hearts, Wicked by Design and Scandalous Alchemy. After a career in publishing, Katy now lives with her husband and three children in a ramshackle Georgian house in the Welsh borders. She is passionate about history, and is involved with multiple projects including Waterloo Uncovered and The Women of Waterloo.

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