VOUS NE CONNAISSEZ RIEN DE MOI

One of the best books I’ve read -- a beautiful story of the power of love to awaken our humanity.

Title: Our absolute FAVORITE of the Rentrée Littéraire~! I read an advanced copy of this book over the summer and it was both a blessing and a curse. Early access is a wonderful privelege, but I have been waiting more than 2 months to yell from the treetops READ THIS BOOK! The fantastic news is that it is finally here! Enfin! If you read in French, please don't even think about it. Just get this book! It is the story of Simone, a teenager growing up in Chartres at the onset of WWII. Petty and often selfish, she is disdainful of her underachieving family and determined to do better for herself. Simone finds inspiration in her German language class at which she excels. And when the Germans invade in 1940 in she is at first excited at Germany's grand ambitions and longs to be part of what she sees as a promising future, and an improvement upon stagnating life in France. She even seeeks employment as a translator at the local **** Headquarters. There she meets Otto, a mild mannered soldier in the propaganda office whose real passion is for literature and libraries. As she fall and Otto work together, and fall in love, Simone learns through his inside knowledge --and her own work which exposes her to the realities of the **** machine -- their true nature. Her admiration of them turns to disgust, and eventually to resistance. The story is in fact inspired by a famous photo "La Tondue de Chartres" Despite her transformation, Simone is seen at the end of the war as a "horizonatal collaborator" for having slept with a German, and as depicted in the photo, she is "tondue"--her paraded around the public square with hear head shaved as retribution. This book was my constant companion for two weeks over the summer, and every night I race to bed too return to the company of Otto and Simone. One of the best books I’ve read -- a beautiful story of the power of love to awaken our humanity.