Through a set of stories the author relates what it was like to endure the Nazi occupation of France. A different look at WWII. The manuscript was unfinished as Irene Nemirovsky was arrested and placed in a concentration camp.

It's kind of an out of body experience to read a French novel about German occupation in WWII that is so kind to the German soldiers. Written by a French person. A Jewish French person. Who died in the Holocaust. There is little to no mention of the Jewish persecution by the German army, and the German soldiers are portrayed as just naive young men, out for glory and doing their duty like any other soldier. It makes you wonder...I'm so used to seeing Nazi soldiers villified, how true is that? Were the everyday soldiers more good or evil than any other soldier? How aware were they of Hitler's real motives?You can tell the book wasn't finished, per se, but it's magnificant, haunting, thought provoking, and moreso because of the conditions under which it wasn't finished. ( )

Buying this book, you get two stories in one and both are well-worth reading. The main story is Nemirovsky´s unfinished novel about the German occupation of France, with her notes and plans. In itself, this is a gripping and captivating story that you don't want to put down. I was more taken by the story of the book, as this book was discovered forty years after the author´s deportation to Auschwitz, in a suitcase her daughter held on to during everything that happend to them, but did not open. It his mindblowing to think about.

In desperate situations, indeed in all situations, experience is an enfolding mix of things that are absurd, terrifying, funny, intriguing, compelling. How well Nemirovsky showed this mix in "Suite Francaise"! But then, situations so close to those in her own life will of course have the tone of authenticity. The wonder is that under terrible conditions she herself was able to see so much complexity.

This isn't just a work of historical fiction, this is a tragedy. The author's own tale is even more dramatic than that of her characters. Nemirovsky, of Jewish and Russian origin, wrote the two novellas of Suite Francaise while hiding with her family in the French countryside during World War II. She was then arrested, and a month later she was killed in Auschwitz. Her manuscripts were toted around by her very young daughters during the duration of the war, and were not published in France until a few years ago.

The novellas evoke what would have been current events for Nemirovsky. Storm in June follows several families of all social castes and attitudes as they flee Paris before the German invasion. The second novella, Dolce, focuses on the German occupation of a French village. The thing that struck me most was the author's fairness in dealing with these very real people. There is no propaganda here, or hatred against the Germans. If anything, her argument is that everyone is human, and that extraordinary circumstances bring out the worst in French and Germans alike. This is particularly moving considering how Nemirosky died.

The appendix and letters in the back detail the the author's writing method, her family history, and the desperate letters sent by her husband and publishers in trying to gain Nemirovsky's release. ( )