The reader knows the geopolitical future Odile does not. She uses that literary device to build tension. The devoted staff, volunteers, and patrons prepare the American Library for German occupation.īack in the states, Lily faces a different kind of battle-the kind history forgets, but never the survivors.īy setting Odile’s story in Paris during World War II, the author gives the reader a clairvoyant lens. With the French Army in full retreat and Nazi troops closing in, the City of Light grows dark and Parisiennes prepare for bombing. Bored, restless, and feeling betrayed by her best friend, she distracts herself by inventing stories about the other misfit that lives next door, an elegant old widow with a mysterious past.įrance 1939: When the American Library receives word that the Maginot Line has failed, Odile’s world shatters. Lily is a brainy misfit facing down the barrel of adolescence in a dusty Montana cow town.

Meanwhile, across the pond and forty years in the future, we meet a second protagonist. As a librarian at ALP, Odile could become a modern, independent, woman in the workforce.much to the ire of her traditional French parents. Fresh out of Library School, she longs for employment at the prestigious American Library of Paris, where she could spend her days immersed in a vast and varied collection of books, rare manuscripts, international magazines and newspapers-rubbing shoulders with its quirky patronage of diplomats, writers, expatriates, politicians, and eccentric French bibliophiles.

Germany stands no chance against France’s superior army and its Maginot Line, bien sûr! Like many young Parisiennes in 1939, the first of two heroines we meet in Janet Skeslien Charles’ The Paris Library is more concerned with day-to-day matters. As Hitler’s troops advance across Europe, Odile Souchet avoids old men and their constant talk of war.

The paris library book