For the Love of Books | Currently Reading March 2021

Our Darkest Night by Jennifer Robson (Kindle): Inspired by true events, this is a story of terror, hope, love, and sacrifice that vividly evokes the most perilous days of World War II.

It is the autumn of 1943, and life is becoming increasingly perilous for Italian Jews like the Mazin family. With Nazi Germany now occupying most of her beloved homeland, and the threat of imprisonment and deportation growing ever more certain, Nina Mazin has but one hope to survive—she must leave Venice and her beloved parents and hide in the countryside with a man she has only just met.

Robson also wrote The Gown.

The Jane Austen Society by Natalie Jenner (Kindle): This charming debut is sure to delight Austen fans. Jane Austen lived out her last days in the sleepy village of Chawton, and in the days just after World War II, her legacy still looms large. Times are hard, and we meet several villagers burdened with their own private sorrows, who are doing what they’ve always done: turning to the works of Austen for solace.

When a local business attempts to buy the Austen property and raze her cottage, the villagers band together to preserve her legacy. At one point, a character muses that Austen’s works present “a world so a part of our own, yet so separate, that entering it is like some kind of tonic.” The same can be said of Jenner’s wonderful book.

I reread two titles by Taylor Jenkins Reid – One True Loves and After I Do.

I also read Blood Orange.