Review of 'The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society' on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
This was at times fun/lighthearted, poignant and moving. Really (really) liked it :)
roman
390 pages
French language
Published Jan. 1, 2009 by NiL.
This was at times fun/lighthearted, poignant and moving. Really (really) liked it :)
**My third reading of this book, and I love Guernsey just as much as I did three years ago. And the audiobook is just perfect!
Just like Juliet, I have fallen in love with Guernsey. I want to pack my bags and live there and join their literary society. I am enchanted.
Journey back in time through a series of correspondence between author Juliet Ashby and the people of Guernsey Island following the occupation of World War II. But beware--you might find you leave a piece of your heart behind. Funny, sweet, dramatic, and curious, I was so absorbed. I just loved this book. I loved everyone in the literary society, especially Dawsey. And I loved the ending, and felt it was the perfect ending to a beautiful book.
What to say? It's an award winner and I have several friends who have rated this book with a five star rating. So I guess I was expecting to love it and I just didn't. It took me way too many days to finish this book and maybe that's an issue in and of itself. If I read it in one sitting maybe it wouldn't have felt so disjointed to me. Anyway, I do love that the book features a "book club" of sorts that loves reading!
This was delightful. At first, it masqueraded as a light, humorous tale, but then it became a lot more than that. And I learned something; I was not aware that the Channel Islands were occupied during WWII. This was yet another war experience I'd never heard before, and the characters were very likeable.
I now have another destination for my bucket list, too. This is a short novel that packed quite a punch!
It's a sweet book. It starts out as a treatise on how the love of literature can spring up in the unlikeliest places, for the unlikeliest reasons. Then it becomes a series of harrowing vignettes on life in occupied Europe during WWII. And finally a simple love story, in which everyone involved is absolutely blind to the existence of the two star-crossed lovers.
Since I visited the Channel Islands for the first time as a little girl (my dad needed to work at Guernsey) I do have a soft spot for these islands.
read more