Maximum Shelf: PARIS NEVER LEAVES YOU (4/8/20)

Today’s Shelf Awareness Maximum Shelf pick is Ellen Feldman’s historical novel of survival, morality, and reckoning with the past, PARIS NEVER LEAVES YOU.

Charlotte is a survivor. She lived through WWII in Paris, working in a bookstore under the watchful eye of the Nazis. Now she and her daughter, Vivi, are safely settled on the upper east side of Manhattan. She’s found a place for herself as an editor in the clubby, eccentric world of NYC publishing and she’s drawn to a man who could quite possibly be the love of her life. However, Vivi is beginning to ask questions about her mother’s past. No one but Charlotte knows her new life has been built on a foundation of lies, one she began to lay the day her fate became entwined with that of a German officer. As everything Charlotte is building for herself and her daughter is threatened, she’s forced to reckon with her past and in doing so risk all she has gained. Alternating between wartime Paris and 1950s New York publishing, PARIS NEVER LEAVES YOU is a compelling story of resilience, love, and impossible choices, exploring how survival never comes without a cost.

“The best works of historical fiction have a way of illuminating the present, allowing readers to better understand themselves through well-defined characters reflected in the prism of time. In PARIS NEVER LEAVES YOU, Ellen Feldman does this beautifully in a multi-layered, tender story that explores the emotionally charged, often parallel terrains of truth, deception, love and heartbreak.”–Shelf Awareness

SEE THE FULL SUMMARY, REVIEW, AND INTERVIEW WITH ELLEN FELDMAN ON SHELF-AWARENESS.COM. AND ENTER TO WIN AN ARC!

Download the e-galley from Edelweiss here.