Such a heartwarming (and at times, gut-wrenching) story of a group of people who come together because of a literary society. There can be no better example of the wonders of reading. Set around the time of the German Occupation of Guernsey, this story is told through letters exchanged between the members of the literary society and an author, Juliet Ashton, who is in search of inspiration for her next book.
I couldn’t peel my eyes off the pages of this remarkable novel, for it is such a fulfilling narrative about love, loss, war and the joy of reading. By the end of it, I felt as if I had truly befriended every member of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie society and was even more saddened that my glimpse into their lives would end so quickly. The epistolary format of this book makes it all the more endearing to me. And I only wish that I had picked it up sooner.
Its witty and crisp writing has left me in a bundle of emotions over the course of my reading. While it makes some great references to canonical authors like Jane Austen, Oscar Wilde and Anne Bronte, the book also supplies us with heartrending anecdotes of the fear, trauma and injury brought on by the atrocities committed by the Germans.
If you were to drop everything you’re doing and settle in with this book, you would find that it’s with good reason. Seriously, pick it up.
The Life Stories 