Book Review: Sarah's Key

Book: Sarah's Key

Author: Tatiana De Rosnay

My rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Brief synopsis:

Paris, July 1942: Sarah, a ten year-old girl, is brutally arrested with her family by the French police in the Vel’ d’Hiv’ roundup, but not before she locks her younger brother in a cupboard in the family's apartment, thinking that she will be back within a few hours.

Paris, May 2002: On Vel’ d’Hiv’s 60th anniversary, journalist Julia Jarmond is asked to write an article about this black day in France's past. Through her contemporary investigation, she stumbles onto a trail of long-hidden family secrets that connect her to Sarah. Julia finds herself compelled to retrace the girl's ordeal, from that terrible term in the Vel d'Hiv', to the camps, and beyond. As she probes into Sarah's past, she begins to question her own place in France, and to reevaluate her marriage and her life.

Tatiana de Rosnay offers us a brilliantly subtle, compelling portrait of France under occupation and reveals the taboos and silence that surround this painful episode.

My Review:

Sarah's Key is a book who many have read before me. It's not a new release, but one I've meant to read for awhile now. So, because of that, I'm going to make the disclaimer, this is a short review.

In short, I liked it, but I didn't love it. And I feel bad about that because I really wanted to love it. There was a lot that was really quite good about this novel... and all that was what revolved around Sarah, rather than Julia. Julia has a sad life and quite honestly, in spite of a few very redeeming moments, I found her to be a bit of a weak heroine.

My great critique is that I wanted to know more of Sarah through her voice. This happened through the first half, then faded as they moved into the second half. I loved that the first half of the novel flipped between the two, but that ended abruptly about half way through. While this change was intentional and made sense in the context, I wanted to know more of Sarah's story and what happened to her after the epic moment where they left off.

What De Rosnay did really well is to give people a historical insight into World War II France. The story of how Jewish families in France were impacted by Nazi occupation was extremely powerful. De Rosnay shared a wonderful glimpse into how this impacted the French, both historically and in present day.

I also have to admit, I could have done without the romantic ties that De Rosnay introduced toward the end. It felt very forced to me and also took away some of the power of Sarah's story. In the end, it made it more of a story of Julia finding happiness, rather than redemption for Sarah.

Now those who have read this can disagree with me. In fact, I hope they do. This book has gotten rave reviews. So, maybe listen to the critics not me. (See the editorial reviews on Amazon.com.)

With that said, I'd recommend this book to a friend. It has a powerful story to tell, that is, if you pay attention to Sarah and the historical context of the book, rather than the present day problems that Julia encounters in her personal life.