The Forgotten Bookshop in Paris: from an exciting new voice in historical fiction comes a gripping and emotional novel

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In 1940 a young married couple is running a bookshop during the Nazi occupation of WWII. How they helped the resistance help Jewish people and resistance workers even children during the war. Their story, their separation and the price they paid for their part in the resistance movement. How in a time of such tension you could trust no one and on trusted patron sold them out to the Nazi's. In 1940 Paris, Jacques and Mathilde had just gotten married as WW2 broke out. Jacques owns a bookshop, while Mathilde works at an art gallery. Eventually, with Germans taking over Paris, the art gallery closes and Mathilde is without a job. Jacques keeps up with the shop, as both secretly aid in the war. Soon, however, Mathilde must escape for her safety. Will Jacques and Mathilde ever see each other again? How does Juliette presently tie in with the history of Jacques and Mathilde? There are secrets to be discovered!!! This is a wonderful novel. I especially liked the descriptions about Mathilde and Jacques. Their story is filled with hope and is heartbreaking at the same time. The book is brilliantly written. The reader is transported in time to wartime Paris. The fear of the citizens, the “disappearing” Jewish people and the strength of the human spirit to hope and resist in the face of terrible odds. Juliette and Kevin are on holiday in Paris from the USA. Juliette is half French and wants to find the square that has been drawn in her late mothers painting, that she kept on her wall for so many years. But things don’t go to plan with the holiday in the city of love. Her Husband Kevin decides that he wants to stop short the holiday and go home but Juliette has other ideas and when she finds out that her husband ha been having an affair, she decides that she wants to stay on in Paris. Books were his livelihood, his passion, his raison d’être; how could he allow them to be destroyed? He had already accepted so much humiliation from the Nazis but this was a step too far.’

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The Forgotten Bookshop in Paris has a dual timeline it’s set in the city of lights during the 1940's and in present time, and it's told from the two main characters points of view. It's a dual POV and dual timeline story with one part set in occupied Paris during WWII. It's more than a love story: it's many love stories, many stories of people being brave and saving others. Jacques POV is poignant and at times hard to read, but there's also hope.The Forgotten Bookshop in Paris is a dual timeline historical fiction novel. Following Jacques, a bookshop owner in France during WWII. And also following Juliette who is spending an extended time in Paris after learning upsetting news.

In the present timeline, you get to follow strong people too. But it felt more like a romance and or women fiction. This is a bit of a dual storyline with part in 1940's Paris during WWII and part in 2022 Paris. It centers around a bookshop in a Paris square. Juliette needed a place to stay and found an apartment above a bookstore and decided to restore the bookstore even though a friend’s grandmother ZiZi who is 97 told her to not dig up the past.

If the author only wrote about the past, this book would have been fantastic...all this section made sense and was beautifully written. I wanted to love this book, but for me it was a complete letdown. Juliette in the present timeline was a character I could care less about and her double standards and whining annoyed me to no end. Her story honestly made me want to DNF the book. The past timeline was better than the present, but it didn’t have much of a wow factor and was actually quite bland. I didn’t connect with the characters like I wanted to.