In his 1996 novel, Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks showed himself to be a superb anatomist of men--and, just as importantly, women--at war. Indeed, his depiction of trench combat during World War I was almost painfully vivid: the equivalent of Wilfred Owen in prose, minus the lingering idealism. Now the author shifts his focus to the next global conflict in Charlotte Gray. This time the year is 1942, when "England was blacked out and afraid." The 25-year-old heroine has just traveled down from Edinburgh to London, hoping to make some contribution to the war effort. In short order she falls in love with a British pilot, mourns his disappearance and apparent death in France, and follows him across the Channel to assist the nascent French Resistance.

On the face of it, these are the ingredients of a historical potboiler. But Faulks is such a gifted storyteller that we seldom notice the threadbare nature of the raw material. Instead, all but the most churlish reader will be drawn into Charlotte's tribulations, which are not merely geopolitical but amorous: "The last thing she needed was some uncontrolled romance. She wanted to be helpful, she wanted to lead a serious life, not to lie sobbing in her bed for a disembodied yearning. Still less did she wish to see it embodied, with the complication and the fear that all that would entail." (Note: Charlotte is that rare thing, a virginal heroine, at least until page 61.) What's more, the author's evocation of Occupied France is a triumph of grimy, monochromatic realism. Here the small triumphs of Charlotte and her circle are expertly offset by the larger tragedies of what we've come to call, with only middling accuracy, the Good War. --William Davies


From Publishers Weekly
Readers of the bestseller Birdsong may hope that Faulks's third novel will furnish another mesmerizing narrative with a piercing love story and the kinds of details that vitalized his descriptions of life in the trenches during WWII. Although this novel does not, sadly, equal its predecessor in terms of seductive readability, its setting in occupied France during WWII and its depiction of the sentiments that motivated many Frenchmen to identify emotionally with the Germans rather than their longtime foe, Britain, grants the story intrinsic interest. But Faulks falters when he asks us to believe that pragmatic young Scotswoman Charlotte Gray is so transformed by her love for RAF airman Peter Gregory that she determines to parachute into France to find him after he disappears on a mission somewhere in the Free Zone. Disguising her motivation, she volunteers for the government's secret G-Section, where her uncanny talent for memorizing documents, her nerves of steel and her equanimity when parachuting into Occupied France after scant training may leave readers incredulous. Even more problematic is Charlotte's sense of transcendent mission, her mystical feeling, stressed again and again, that she has received "a call" to find Peter, and that her work for the Resistance is a "compelling urgency of personal and moral force" that will "change my life.. save my soul... and save [France's] soul as well." In evoking the mood and atmosphere of 1942-1943 France, however, Faulks provides the nuanced detail that invests the novel with authenticity, irony and pathos. Charlotte's dangerous maneuvers as she meets Resistance members and integrates herself into the village of Lavaurette, and the alternating chapters that reveal Peter's predicament, are genuinely absorbing. When Faulks introduces two small Jewish boys who are left behind in the village when their parents are deported, their heartrending situation adds tension. Yet Faulks undermines these effective scenes with a plot device that fizzles: veiled hints about Charlotte's "betrayal and violation" by her father when she was a child. Despite the psychological inconsistencies, however, in the end, it is the convincing settings?the wartime London singles scene, the old boy spy network, and daily life in an ideologically and politically divided France?that shape dramatic immediacy. Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
Shortly after the death of a surrogate father figure in a French internment camp in occupied France, Charlotte notes "that her emotions could not encompass the complexity of feeling that the circumstances seemed to demand." It is a comment that can be applied to the book itself. As a story about the power of love, it uplifts the spirit. As a story of the dispassionate evil of the Nazis, it brings tears to the eyes. As a story about ordinary people struggling to survive, it arouses admiration, understanding, and revulsion. Charlotte is a young Scotswoman who travels to London and falls for an RAF pilot. When he crashes in France, Charlotte wrangles her way into the British secret service in order to find him. If the scenario seems a bit overwrought, it is. But then new love often is. Faulks (Birdsong, LJ 1/96) has written one of those rare books that is adventurous enough to attract a popular audience while thoughtful enough to sustain the more serious reader. Highly recommended.-?David W. Henderson, Eckerd Coll. Lib., St. Petersburg, FLCopyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.


The New York Times Book Review, Anita Gates
...what is essentially a love story turns into a sensitive, powerful reflection on moral anguish in Vichy France.


The New York Times, Richard Bernstein
So many subjects, so many disparate fates, so much good and evil is explored here (there is even a subplot involving a sort of recovered-memory syndrome) that Charlotte Gray sometimes threatens to explode into its constituent genres. But there is no shortage of dramatic tension, excitement or persuasive period detail, and Faulks ... certainly does know how to write.


From AudioFile
Samuel West has a splendid voice and makes it leap through hoops. He's slightly Scottish for Charlotte Gray, the eponymous beauty somewhat inclined to depression. He's English for the RAF pilot who gives her a reason to live. Then he's very "pip, pip" through the nostrils for the officers that send them both into France and behind enemy lines. Not a mindless thriller, really not a thriller at all, this is literature, an attempt to inhabit others. We come to understand the banality of evil, a Vichy France that not only collected its own people, but paid Germany for the trains they rode in and for the meals they ate on the way to the death camps. B.H.C. An AudioFile Earphones Award winner. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine


From Kirkus Reviews
Englands redoubtable Faulks (A Fool's Alphabet, 1993; Birdsong, 1996) offers up a third solid, alluring, durable novelset in 194243, just as the tide begins to turn, however slightly, against the Nazis. Charlotte Graypretty, intelligent, well-educatedis in her middle 20s when she leaves her native Scotland for London, hoping that in the capital she can do something more significant for the war effort. She wouldnt have expected, though, that a chance encounter with a worker in the secret diplomatic corps would lead to her being interviewed by G Section and sent (in careful disguise) to France to work within the very gradually unifying Resistance there. Even though (before shes parachuted into the village of Lavourette) Charlotte has fallen passionately in love with war-wearied RAF pilot Peter Gregory (who, not long after, goes missing), and even though her also-intense love of France is muddied by a badly impacted father-complex (her aloof parent, now a psychoanalyst, fought there in WWI), Charlotte is anything but the typically starry-eyed girl looking for love, adventure, and meaning. Faulkss perfect and never false descriptions of France under the Occupationthe hunger, the monochrome bleakness, the increasing dangersuit Charlottes mature young character just as perfectly as do the people she meets (Julien Levade, the idealistic young architect and resistance worker; his aging failed-artist father; varieties of townspeople on both the political left and right) and as do the dangers she herself encounters: never melodramatic, always riveting. Nor have grief and horror been more wrenchingly and unremittingly portrayed than here when first Juliens father and then the two young Jewish boys whom Julien has been hiding are sent to the camps and their deaths. What happens to Charlotte in the end may be less satisfying than other elements of her story, but the resolution, even so, leaves nothing of seriousness behind. A war novel that should take its place among the masterpieces of the genre. -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.


Review
"A miraculous novel. . . . Faulks is a master indeed." --San Francisco Chronicle

"Eloquent and moving. . . . A page turner for grown-ups, a novel with the rich detail of a great historical narrative." -The Baltimore Sun

"There is no shortage of dramatic tension, excitement or persuasive detail [in Charlotte Gray]. . . .  Mr. Faulks is a prodigiously talented writer." --The New York Times

"This powerful novel...explodes into an immensely gripping tale." --The Wall Street Journal

"What begins as a conventional love story becomes an adventure of the spirit... Charlotte Gray has depth and texture." --The Washington Post


Review
"A miraculous novel. . . . Faulks is a master indeed." --San Francisco Chronicle

"Eloquent and moving. . . . A page turner for grown-ups, a novel with the rich detail of a great historical narrative." -The Baltimore Sun

"There is no shortage of dramatic tension, excitement or persuasive detail [in Charlotte Gray]. . . .  Mr. Faulks is a prodigiously talented writer." --The New York Times

"This powerful novel...explodes into an immensely gripping tale." --The Wall Street Journal

"What begins as a conventional love story becomes an adventure of the spirit... Charlotte Gray has depth and texture." --The Washington Post


Book Description
From the bestselling author of Birdsong comes Charlotte Gray, the remarkable story of a young Scottish woman who becomes caught up in the effort to liberate Occupied France from the Nazis while pursuing a perilous mission of her own.

In blacked-out, wartime London, Charlotte Gray develops a dangerous passion for a battle-weary RAF pilot, and when he fails to return from a daring flight into France she is determined to find him. In the service of the Resistance, she travels to the village of Lavaurette, dyeing her hair and changing her name to conceal her identity. Here she will come face-to-face with the harrowing truth of what took place during Europe's darkest years, and will confront a terrifying secret that threatens to cast its shadow over the remainder of her days. Vividly rendered, tremendously moving, and with a narrative sweep and power reminiscent of his novel Birdsong, Charlotte Gray confirms Sebastian Faulks as one of the finest novelists working today.


From the Inside Flap
From the bestselling author of Birdsong comes Charlotte Gray, the remarkable story of a young Scottish woman who becomes caught up in the effort to liberate Occupied France from the Nazis while pursuing a perilous mission of her own.

In blacked-out, wartime London, Charlotte Gray develops a dangerous passion for a battle-weary RAF pilot, and when he fails to return from a daring flight into France she is determined to find him. In the service of the Resistance, she travels to the village of Lavaurette, dyeing her hair and changing her name to conceal her identity. Here she will come face-to-face with the harrowing truth of what took place during Europe's darkest years, and will confront a terrifying secret that threatens to cast its shadow over the remainder of her days. Vividly rendered, tremendously moving, and with a narrative sweep and power reminiscent of his novel Birdsong, Charlotte Gray confirms Sebastian Faulks as one of the finest novelists working today.


From the Back Cover
"A miraculous novel. . . . Faulks is a master indeed." --San Francisco Chronicle

"Eloquent and moving. . . . A page turner for grown-ups, a novel with the rich detail of a great historical narrative." -The Baltimore Sun

"There is no shortage of dramatic tension, excitement or persuasive detail [in Charlotte Gray]. . . . Mr. Faulks is a prodigiously talented writer." --The New York Times

"This powerful novel...explodes into an immensely gripping tale." --The Wall Street Journal

"What begins as a conventional love story becomes an adventure of the spirit... Charlotte Gray has depth and texture." --The Washington Post


About the Author
Sebastian Faulks is best known for his trilogy of novels set in France: The Girl at the Lion d’Or, Birdsong, and Charlotte Gray, the latter two of which were bestsellers. After a period in France, he and his family now live in London.


Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Peter Gregory kicked the door of the dispersal hut closed behind him with the heel of his boot. He sensed the iciness of the air outside but was too well wrapped to feel it on his skin. He looked up and saw a big moon hanging still, while ragged clouds flew past and broke up like smoke in the darkness. He began to waddle across the grass, each step won from the limits of movement permitted by the parachute that hung down behind as he bucked and tossed his way forward. He heard the clank of the corporal fitter's bicycle where it juddered over the ground to his right. The chain needed oiling, he noted; the man was in the wrong gear and a metal mudguard was catching on the tyre with a rhythmic slur as the wheel turned.

He could see the bulk of his plane ahead, large in the night, with the three-bladed propeller stopped at a poised diagonal, the convex sweep of the upper fuselage looking sleeker in the darkness than by day. The fitter dropped his bicycle to the ground. He made his way over in the light of a feeble torch which he gripped between his teeth as he helped, with both hands braced against his parachute, to push Gregory up onto the wing. Then he clambered up himself as Gregory hoisted a leg over the side of the cockpit and slithered down inside.

"God, it's cold," said the fitter. "My hands can't feel a thing. This north wind."
Gregory switched on the instrument lighting and settled onto the sculpted metal seat, trying to make himself comfortable on his parachute.

The fitter was talking as Gregory's eyes went over the lit dials. "My boy's got this cough. I don't know what I can do about it, stuck down here. Oxygen?"
The engine was started and the man was off the wing. He bobbed about underneath, then stood clear as Gregory ran up the engine before signalling him to pull out the chocks that held the plane against the wind. Gregory saw him hold up the torch when at la.st he straightened and picked up his fallen bicycle; he gave him a minute to pedal his way back to the fug of the blacked-out mess, to sweet tea and cigarettes. Then he opened the throttle and let the little plane creep forward across the grass, bouncin.g on plump wheels.

When he had taxied to the end of the strip, he turned the plane into the wind and waited. He shivered. With his bare fingers he was able to check the fixture of the oxygen and radio-transmitter leads in his headset. He inhaled the intoxicating smell of rotting rubber from his mask, then pulled the glove back onto his hand and grasped the stick between his knees.

The R/T barked in his ear--someone impatient to get to the barrel of beer he had seen being wheeled in that afternoon. The wind veered a little, due north, between the lines of hooded lamps on either side of the strip; it was making the plane toss like a .small boat at anchor. Gregory checked the propeller was in fine pitch and opened the throttle. He moved forward.

Almost at once the tail lifted and he felt the controls firm up in his hand. The engine moaned, and the plane bumped its way down the strip, where the forces of wind and speed first lifted it, then dropped it back to earth. He sensed the wheels come clear, then felt the ground once more banging through his spine as a down-draught forced him back. He began to mutter through clenched jaws, cursing, then with a small inward movement of his fingers eased the stick and felt the earth gone as the plane rose u.p greedily on the air.

Two red lights showed that the wheels were up and locked away. Watching the compass with one eye, he set the plane in a gentle climbing turn to the left. At about ten thousand feet he ran into moist and choppy cloud, thicker and more turbulent than he ha.d seen about the moon. He feared the plane's jolting movement as he nosed it upward: there was the sense of something else up there with them, another element bearing down on the clean lines of his flight. His eyes ran along the rows of instruments. Flyi.ng by night was a violation of instinct; there were no steeples or bridges from which to take a bearing, no flash of wingtip or underbelly to show the vital presence of other aircraft The Spitfire pilots' speed and daytime coordination were of no use: there were needles in glass jars and you had to trust them Even when you swore you could feel the brush of treetops on the undercarriage, you must believe the altimeter's finger pointing at ten thousand feet.

As the thudding airscrew churned up the night, Gregory stretched inside his clothes His feet were cold, despite the flying boots and two pairs of thick socks; he lifted them momentarily off the rudder bars and stamped them on the floor of the plane. Kilpatrick and Simmons had laughed when they came to fetch him to the mess after a flight one day and found him with his feet in a basin of hot water.

He was crossing the coast of England: chalk cliffs, sailing dinghies moored for better days, seaside towns with their whitewashed houses along the narrow streets that trickled down to wind-whipped fronts. When as a boy from India he had been sent to school by the English coast he had hated that wind and the blank sea with its baggy grey horizon.

This was the third time he had undertaken a similar flight, but it had taken him months to persuade his superiors that it was worth the risk First there was the squadron commander, Landon, to convince; then there was Group HQ to be won over The Senior Air Staff Officer told Landon he could not possibly risk losing a plane, let alone an experienced pilot, in such circumstances Gregory was never quite sure what Landon had finally said to convince him.

He shook his head and rubbed his thighs with his hands Beneath the fur-lined flying suit he wore a serge battledress, roll-necked sweater, pyjamas and a thick wool and silk aircrew vest If at least his feet had been warm, that might have stopped his body heat from leaking out onto the frozen rudder bars.  As the little plane ploughed onwards, the instruments telling their unexcited story, Gregory felt a frisson of unearned responsibility: alone, entrusted, above the world Then he moved the stick forwards to begin his descent.

He had been to the town before the Germans came A French pilot took him to a bar called the Guillaume Tell, where they drank champagne, then to another where they ordered beer. The evening ended at La Lune, which was a brothel, but the French pilot didn't seem to care about the girls From Le Havre the squadron moved up the coast to Deauville and played golf.

When he dropped into the cloud, Gregory began to feel the familiar, unwanted sensation of such moments: someone would soon try to kill him In Le Havre an anti-aircraft gunner, though he didn't yet know it himself, would concentrate only on this murder. When Gregory had experienced ground-fire from British and French batteries, who had wrongly identified his aircraft as German, it had made him aware that the plane was nothing more than a few pieces of airborne metal and wood Anti-aircraft fire was different from fighter fire, though one thing was the same: a few inches from his eyes was a fuel tank waiting to explode.

Now he could make out the shape of docks, so far, the terrestrial world, beneath his boots; there were minimal lights, evidence of some defensive caution, but he could remember from his study of photographs where the oil tanks were. He put the plane into a leftward banking turn, wanting to gain height and gather himself for the dive He reached the top of his shallow climb and checked his position, hanging in the icy air.

He was laughing, though he heard nothing above the engine; for one more moment he held the plane level, then opened the throttle and pushed the stick forward.  He watched the airspeed indicator moving up: 340, 360.  He was coming in too steep: he was nose-heavy, he felt he would go over.  Then, when he could see the ground--industrial shadows, bulky darkness--he could gauge where his horizon was He held the stick steady Gravity was starting to push his eyes back into their sockets and he began to swear.  He could see what he took to be the oil depot and twitched the rudder to align himself.  At last there was some response from the ground: he saw red balls of tracer curving through the air like boiling fruit, lazy until they reached him, then whipping past at the speed of light Nothing was coming close to him.  His thumb stroked the gun button, and when the ground was so near he could almost sense it through his seat, he let the cannon go.

He heard their sound, like ripping cloth, as he pulled the stick back violently to climb He craned his neck but could see no gratifying holocaust beneath him, not even isolated fires When he thought he was out of range of ground defences, he slowed the rate of climb and felt the pressure slip from his neck and shoulders.  He throttled back a little as he headed out northwest towards the sea; there was sweat running down his spine.

He breathed in and dropped the speed again, safe above the Channel waters He let the plane drift in a circle while he gathered himself and listened, but there was only the chugging engine and the slight whistle of wind through the airframe.  His Hurricane carried four 20-mm Hispano cannons, known to their admirers as "tank-busters," and four 250-lb bombs in place of its regular machine guns.  He calculated that he had about half his ammunition left; he could not return to base with it and he could not fire it into the empty sky as he flew back.

He went round once more, making certain of his position, then began to lose height slowly He pushed through the light cloud and picked up the outlines of the port below: he would flatten out along the harbour wall and fire as he turned to climb.

This time, the tracer started coming up at once, along the path of a weak searchlight Gregory opened the throttle wider and closed his ears to the engine's screaming.  The plane was juddering as he straightened out.  He was so low that he could see the ground, and there were no oil tanks in view He switched the button to fire and emptied the cannon at random in the direction of some parked lorries Then he pulled back the stick and climbed as fast as he could.  He saw the tracer again on his port wing; then the rudder kicked his feet and he knew he had been shot in the tail.

The tracer stopped coming for him He looked down and saw a foaming black sea of welcome cloud.  He started to level out, then breathed in deeply and blew the air towards the windscreen.  He tested the rudder, one way, then the other; it seemed to react quite normally--the blow to the tail had apparently done no damage.

The southern shore of England was ahead At the airfield, there would be someone waiting for him at dispersal, with whisky if he wanted it Nothing could hurt him.  The others were dead, but he was untouchable.

It had become suddenly brighter A mixture of elation and indifference to his own safety made him want to roll the plane upward, and he opened the throttle again: 320, 350 the needle said He adjusted the tail trim: it responded He pulled the stick back, gently, then harder till he felt the plane was vertical, hanging on the propeller He pushed the stick over to the right and felt the aircraft go round.  He stopped and pushed the stick back.  The horizon was upside down in the night He could see nothing, but he knew how the plane was flying He pushed the stick forward, then over to the left, and rolled out.

He felt sick Then he felt worse than sick: he felt disorientated He did not know which way up he was; sudden clouds were covering up the light of the moon.  He pulled the stick back to climb but felt he was spinning; he was aware of the vastness of space around him and the little box in which he was plummeting.

Bloody Isaac, he was saying into his mouthpiece.  Unless he could get a fix by a light or by some static point he did not know which way to push the stick.  The tail must be more damaged than he had thought.

The plane bumped as it went into the cloud, and through the floor, though it must have been the canopy, Gregory briefly saw the moon . Craning his neck to keep the light in view, he brought the plane up and round on its axis.  His back was aching with the pull and from the effort of keeping the moon in sight as he hauled the invisible horizon to where it should have been, the moon above, the ground below.

He dropped the speed and reset the altitude instruments, whose gyroscopes had been toppled by his roll.  Something was wrong; although the rudder seemed to work, the weight did not feel right He set his course for the airfield and hoped the wind would let him land.  Eventually he picked out the flarepath and brought his speed down to 150, then lowered the wheels He slowed again for the flaps, turned in steeply and felt the crosswind hammering the plane as he reached up to open the hood.  The rudder bars were shivering as the wind ran through the damaged tail; below him, Gregory could see the pale runway lamps as they lurched from side to side He sank the plane down gently, but it kicked and rose on the wind, out towards the edge of the field He pushed open the throttle and began to climb again.  This time he came in from a different angle and hit the ground hard He held it down and braked.

He taxied to dispersal, ran the petrol out of the carburettor and switched off He unstrapped himself and climbed out of the cockpit.  As he stood on the wing he felt his legs tremble.

He walked over to the hut, pulling off his headset, running a hand back through his hair.  There was the smell of a coke brazier; there was an anxious red face in the light.
"How was it, Greg?"
"It was cold."

FROM OUR EDITORS

The Barnes & Noble Review
"Although this is a work of fiction, I have tried to represent the historical background as it actually was," Sebastian Faulks writes in a note to this fine novel. Faulks — best known in the United States for Birdsong, his acclaimed World War I novel — turns in Charlotte Gray to the dark heart of the 20th Century: World War II — and in particular the black year of 1942, while Germany still loomed as the likely victor.

Charlotte Gray sounds like the title of a 19th-century novel, and its heroine is a young woman who — like George Eliot's Dorothea Brooke or Henry James's Isabel Archer — draws everyone to her by virtue of her radiant if fragile promise. She is passionate, mercurial, intelligent — and aloof, as yet, to life. She puts people in mind of life's potential, a quality that in wartime is everywhere stunted and maimed.

In the winter of 1942, Charlotte leaves her home in Edinburgh (she is Scottish, as she likes to insist, not English) for London, wanting to do something — she's not sure quite what — for the war effort. On the train she meets Dick Cannerly, who will later put her in touch with something called G Section, a shadowy British organization devoted to fomenting and assisting the Resistance in Vichy, France. In London, Charlotte attends a pretentious literary party and finds herself dancing with RAF pilot Peter Gregory — and before long she falls in love with this kind, damaged veteran of the Battle of Britain. Their love is barely conceived, though, when Gregory goes down in a new mission over France. Shortly thereafter, an interview with G Section provides Charlotte the opportunity to go to France as a courier. This is her official mission, at any rate; her secret, quixotic one is, of course, to find Gregory.

Charlotte Gray is a suspenseful high-wire act and a brilliantly affecting love story set against a sweeping backdrop of world history. Some may read it without tears, but few will read it without gratitude. Compelling, detailed, and boundlessly humane, it is, as a historical novel, a virtuoso performance.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

IN 1942, Charlotte Gray, a young scottish woman, goes to Occupied France on a dual mission:to run an apparantly simple errand for a British special operations group and to search for her lover, an English airman called Peter Gregory, who has gone missing in action. In the small town of Lavaurette, Sebastian Faulks presents a microcosm of France and its agony in 'the black years', here is the full range of collaboration, from the tacit to the enthusiastic, as well as examples of extraordinary courage and altruism. Through the local resistance chief Julien, Charlotte meets his father a Jewish painter whose inspiration has failed him. In Charlotte's friendship with both men, Faulks opens up the theme of false memory and of paradises—both national and personal—that appear irredeemably lost. In a series of shocking narrative climaxes in which the full extent of French collusion in the Nazi holocaust is delineated, Faulks brings the story to a resolution of redemptive love. In the delicacy of its writing, the intimacy of its characterisation and its powerful narrative scenes of harrowing public events, Charlotte Gray is a worthy successor to Birdsong.

SYNOPSIS

Sebastian Faulks, author of the acclaimed novel of World War I Birdsong, returns with an ambitious new novel about a complex love affair that is both a gift and a casualty of war. Set in England and in France during the black year of 1942, Charlotte Gray is the story of a young Scottish woman who travels to London in order to contribute to the war effort, but instead falls in love with an RAF pilot shortly before his plane is lost over France. Determined to learn his fate, she too undertakes a mission to France as a courier for British Intelligence, then stays on to work for the Resistance. Suspenseful, affecting, detailed, and boundlessly humane, Charlotte Gray is a historical novel that few readers will read without tears, and that all will read with gratitude.

FROM THE CRITICS

Sunday Telegraph

One of the most impressive novelists of our generation...who is growing in authority with every book.

Richard Bernstein

It is a love story and a spy story and a story about historical injury as well as a story about the Holocaust, the politics of Vichy, and the particulars of the infamous camp at Drancy...[T]hanks to the complex, enchanting vehicle of Charlotte and Mr. Faulk's grasp of political and moral history, he manages to make it work. —The New York Times

Anita Gates

...[V]ery readable....what is essentially a love story turns into a sensitive, powerful reflection on moral anguish in Vichy France....[with] something serious to say about the human condition: about changing perceptions of morality, existential solitude, the demumanizing effects of war, the nature of romantic love. —The New York Times Book Review

Financial Times

Faulks is beyond a doubt a master.

Daily Express