Lynne Olson

This was a brilliant book. The author chose to focus on 4 women: Germaine Tillion, Anise Girard, Geneviève de Gaulle and Jacqueline d’Alincourt, all of whom had been members of the French Resistance and who had been imprisoned at Ravensbruck.

They truly forged a sisterhood, helping each other and other women in the camp. Despite the hellish landscape, they treated laughter as resistance, often singing songs in French to mock their captors. In fact, Germaine Tillion created an operetta show more revue called Le Verfugbar Aux Enfers to amuse the other women. It was filled with dark humor and a longing for what they had left behind in France.

Every day they lived was an act of resistance against the Nazis. At the risk of their own lives, they helped the young Polish women known as "rabbits," women who had been forced to endure medical experiments. They created improvised hiding places for the "rabbits" when the camp administrators wanted to remove all trace of them near the end of the war.

Even after they were repatriated, they weren't given the credit they deserved. They fought to get recognition and compensation, not just for the French resisters who had been imprisoned at Ravensbruck but for the Polish "rabbits."

Throughout the rest of their lives, these 4 women remained close.

This book shows the marvel of the human spirit and the bond that can exist between people when faced with unspeakable evil.

The author did a tremendous job researching and included words from the women themselves. It was incredibly moving.

*ARC provided by Edelweiss+* show less

“How could one not be fascinated by the story of this cultured young woman from a well-connected family who had dreams of becoming a concert pianist but ended up as arguably the greatest wartime spymaster in Europe?”

Marie-Madeleine Fourcade was the leader of an espionage network across occupied France in WWII at a time when it was rare for a woman to be in charge. The book describes how she handled many challenges and narrow escapes. The title implies it is about Madame Fourcade, but it show more is written about many, many people in her spy network and it is often difficult to keep track of them all. Names are mentioned once or twice, sometimes never to be mentioned again. There are many digressions. It is almost as if the author decided to include all her research rather than only that which supports the main thesis. I applaud the author for calling attention to an unsung heroine of WWII. I wish it had been a little more focused. show less

Marie-Madeleine Fourcade was an amazing person. At the age of thirty-one, Fourcade became the head of France's largest Resistance intelligence group, Alliance. The fact that she was a woman made her accomplishments even harder won and more remarkable. Lynne Olson's readable narrative of Fourcade's life and years as chef de résistance brings to the attention of Western readers a woman whose story deserves to be known and honored.

Often underestimated because of her privileged upbringing and show more glamorous pre-war life, Fourcade was a force of determination and daring who bucked societal norms to become a pilot, get a job, and separate from her husband. When she was approached by Navarre, a former French military intelligence officer, to help him establish a clandestine journal trying to sway French military opinion prior to the war, she didn't hesitate. Their partnership led to the creation of Alliance, a nationwide resistance organization that provided key information to the Allies about submarine installations and movements, the V-2 rocket, the Normandy coast, and much, much more. In the last months of the war, Alliance provided information directly to General Patton as he moved his army into Germany. When Navarre was arrested in 1941, Fourcade stepped into the breach and became the head of Alliance for the rest of the war.

Fourcade had to learn as she went: how to be a spy, how to organize and run a resistance organization, and how to persuade men, many former military, to accept the leadership of a woman. Despite being separated from her children, being constantly on the run, and captured by the Nazis twice, Fourcade was unstoppable. Her personal bravery was only outshone by her organizational skills. Alliance operated over all of France, and she built cells in all the major cities, only to have them be destroyed by the capture of its agents, but would rebuild them with single-minded determination and dedication.

Despite her amazing leadership during the war, Fourcade was not named a Compagnons de la Liberation, France's highest honor for heroes of the Resistance. In fact, of the 1,038 members, 1032 were men. Perhaps now, with this book, Fourcade will receive the admiration and accolades that she should have received during her lifetime. Highly recommended. show less

This is London.

To be specific, this is London during the Second World War. For much of the war, London was the western front in the fight against Germany. The continental nations had all collapsed under the onslaught of the Wehrmacht, leaving England as the last bastion of freedom in Europe. The citizens of London tenaciously withstood the nightly bombings of the Luftwaffe while the Americans dithered. But in time, all of that would change. Churchill and Roosevelt would eventually create an show more Anglo-American alliance which stands as one of the greatest and most successful military coalitions in history.

Lynne Olson's new book tells the story of how a small group of Americans fought to make England's war with Germany an American war as well. The book focuses on three Americans in London: Edward R. Murrow, head of CBS News in Europe, W. Averell Harriman, America's Lend-Lease coordinator in England, and John Gilbert Winant, the US Ambassador to the Court of St. James. Each of these men strove to bind the Americans and British together in a struggle to save the soul of western civilization.

"Citizens of London" is less of a history than an extended human interest story. The outlines of the historical course of the war are there, but that is not Olson's focus. Instead, her interest lies, as is clear from the title, with the people of London, with those qualities and incidents which define that singular place and time that was London during the war. She manages to evoke the changing seasons of London's war, from the desperation and deprivation of the Blitz, to the raucous build-up of troops for the cross-channel invasion, to the quiet emptiness of the final war years as troops and governments in exile drained out of England as nation after nation was liberated.

Olson's focus on the off duty interactions of the Americans GIs with the British citizenry is somewhat problematic in that it gives the false impression that it was one long, free-wheeling party up until D-Day. We seldom see the grueling work that lies behind the carnival atmosphere of the social scene. The grim, charged atmosphere of the American daylight bombing raids are practically the only evocation of the realities of war during that time. Instead, you get the feeling that there were a million American soldiers milling about southern England with nothing better to do than drink, fight and sleep with English girls. When stood against the horrors that were Leningrad and Stalingrad, it makes America's war seem frivolous, inconsequential and almost shameful.

Perhaps the best part of "Citizens of London" is the relatively forgotten story of Gil Winant, a shy, idealistic diplomat and friend of the Roosevelts, who worked tirelessly to relieve the inevitable tensions which resulted from so many American soldiers being stationed in England. He is portrayed with such glowing terms, that it's clear the author became enamored with this forgotten diplomat while researching the book. One can hope that this book will restore the man to his rightful place in the history of World War II and Anglo-American relations. show less