Review: The Book of Lost Names

I hadn't read any of Kristin Harmel's novels before diving into The Book of Lost Names, her latest and just being published this week. Which is silly since I have a copy of her last book, The Winemaker's Wife, sitting on my shelf just wondering when I'm going to get around to reading it. (I wish I knew.) But, after reading this historical novel, I think I'm going to have to make time soon to read her others. She takes a part of history and makes it come alive in a really entertaining and interesting way.

Here's the synopsis:

Eva Traube Abrams, a semi-retired librarian in Florida, is shelving books one morning when her eyes lock on a photograph in a magazine lying open nearby. She freezes; it’s an image of a book she hasn’t seen in sixty-five years—a book she recognizes as The Book of Lost Names.

The accompanying article discusses the looting of libraries by the Nazis across Europe during World War II—an experience Eva remembers well—and the search to reunite people with the texts taken from them so long ago. The book in the photograph, an eighteenth-century religious text thought to have been taken from France in the waning days of the war, is one of the most fascinating cases. Now housed in Berlin’s Zentral- und Landesbibliothek library, it appears to contain some sort of code, but researchers don’t know where it came from—or what the code means. Only Eva holds the answer—but will she have the strength to revisit old memories and help reunite those lost during the war?

As a graduate student in 1942, Eva was forced to flee Paris after the arrest of her father, a Polish Jew. Finding refuge in a small mountain town in the Free Zone, she begins forging identity documents for Jewish children fleeing to neutral Switzerland. But erasing people comes with a price, and along with a mysterious, handsome forger named Rémy, Eva decides she must find a way to preserve the real names of the children who are too young to remember who they really are. The records they keep in The Book of Lost Names will become even more vital when the resistance cell they work for is betrayed and Rémy disappears.

I read a lot of historical fiction and a lot of it tends to take place during or between the World Wars. In part that's because there are a lot of those kinds of books out there but it's also because it's a time period that really intrigues me. I know the broad strokes of history but there's so much I don't know and novels like Harmel's teach me a few things I hadn't heard of before. I've realized over the years that I like to use historical fiction, whether that's books or movies, as a base before I start watching documentaries or, less often, reading non-fiction titles on the same events. I guess it helps me to have a story in place instead of a bunch of facts. (Also likely why I don't remember much from history class.) That's why I appreciate the authors who dive into a time period, do the research, and create a story that is based in fact but allows me to see a bit better what things would have been like during that time. I'll never know exactly what it was like but books like The Book of Lost Names helps me understand a little bit more.

One thing I struggle with in some historical fiction is how much these heroines would have really known. I love reading about young women as they learn more about the world around them and fight for what is right, sometimes at the risk of their own lives, but I always have to wonder...how much did they know and how much is the author putting into their heads? It's never enough to fully take away from whatever story I'm reading but it's always a thought in the back of my head. It just always kind of seems like they go from naive girls to strong, capable women in an instant. Which, I guess, is possible given the circumstances. I can't know what it's like to have to deal with a war in my backyard or worrying that any beliefs I may have will get me arrested or executed. Eva is an educated young woman, she's going to school at the Sorbonne when we first meet her, but even she has a hard time putting two and two together when she's asked to help the underground resistance. Perhaps I expect too much of these heroines or, on the flip side, don't think enough of the women who lived during that time though, as I said, it's never really affected my enjoyment of the overall story. It just makes me wonder and think. (And shouldn't all books make you think at least a little bit?)

Does anyone else ever notice it's weird when you know characters are speaking another language, though you're reading it in English, and the author throws in phrases in the language they're supposed to be speaking? It happened a lot with this book as Harmel wrote the characters, who would have been speaking French to each other, saying things en français. Eva would be talking along to someone and then say, "Oui, monsieur." like she wasn't already speaking French. Again, not something that takes away from my enjoyment of the story (it's actually fun right now as I'm taking French lessons online and I test myself with the phrases before the characters/author translates them for the reader), but it can be a bit jarring and I wonder what the purpose is. Just to remind us where the story is set and what language the characters are speaking?

I read this book in two sittings. It's one of those stories that really captivated me. I cared about the characters. All of them, not just Eva and Rémy, but the people they were helping, especially the children, and all the unnamed individuals who were fighting in the resistance. I wanted them all to be safe even though I knew that would be impossible. My heart swelled with the love blossoming between Eva and Rémy and it broke when things went about as you'd expect and people were betrayed, killed, or left behind. There are a lot of emotions to be had in this novel and Harmel writes them all with skill and care. 

Read The Book of Lost Names for the story Kristin Harmel weaves. She teaches and reminds readers what atrocities occurred during World War II and shines a light on the kind of people who fought back, even while risking their own lives. 

*An egalley of this novel was provided by the publisher, Simon & Schuster Canada, via NetGalley in exchange for review consideration. All opinions are honest and my own.*