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    News of Our Loved Ones
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    News of Our Loved Ones
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    News of Our Loved Ones
    Ebook228 pages4 hours

    News of Our Loved Ones

    By Abigail DeWitt

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    Set in France and America, News of Our Loved Ones is a haunting and intimate examination of love and loss, beauty and the cost of survival, witnessed through two generations of one French family, whose lives are all touched by the tragic events surrounding the D-Day bombings in Normandy.

    What if your family’s fate could be traced back to one indelible summer?

    Over four long years, the Delasalle family has struggled to live in their Nazi occupied village in Normandy. Maman, Oncle Henri, Yvonne, and Françoise silently watched as their Jewish neighbors were arrested or wordlessly disappeared. Now in June 1944, when the sirens wail each day, warning of approaching bombers, the family wonders if rumors of the coming Allied invasion are true—and if they will survive to see their country liberated.

    For sixteen-year-old Yvonne, thoughts of the war recede when she sees the red-haired boy bicycle past her window each afternoon. Murmuring to herself I love you, I love you, I love you, she wills herself to hear the whisper of his bicycle tires over the screech of Allied bombs falling from the sky.

    Yvonne’s sister, Geneviève, is in Paris to audition for the National Conservatory. Pausing to consider the shadow of a passing cloud as she raises her bow, she does not know that her family’s home in Normandy lies in the path of British and American bombers. While Geneviève plays, her brother Simon and Tante Chouchotte, anxiously await news from their loved ones in Normandy.

    Decades later, Geneviève, the wife of an American musician, lives in the United States. Each summer she returns to her homeland with her children, so that they may know their French family. Geneviève’s youngest daughter, Polly, becomes obsessed with the stories she hears about the war, believing they are the key to understanding her mother and the conflicting cultures shaping her life.

    Moving back and forth in time, told from varying points of view, News of Our Loved Ones explores the way family histories are shared and illuminates the power of storytelling to understand the past and who we are.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateOct 2, 2018
    ISBN9780062834737
    Unavailable
    News of Our Loved Ones
    Author

    Abigail DeWitt

    Abigail DeWitt is the author of three novels: LILI (WW Norton), DOGS (Lorimer Press), and NEWS OF OUR LOVED ONES (forthcoming from Harper in 2018). Her short fiction has appeared in Five Points, Witness, the Alaska Quarterly Review, the Carolina Quarterly, and elsewhere. She has been cited in BEST AMERICAN SHORT STORIES, nominated for a Pushcart, and has received grants and fellowships from the North Carolina Arts Council, the Tyrone Guthrie Center, the McColl Center for the Arts, and the Michener Society.

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    Reviews for News of Our Loved Ones

    3.5/5

    5 ratings1 review

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    • 4/5
      3.5 This beautifully written novel focuses on the aftermath of war, it's effect on those of generations to come, rather than on the war itself. It exposes how memories vary from one person to the next, by giving us a series of connected stories, or experiences if you will. Each chapter provides a piece of the puzzle, each character their own story, until the piece is finished. A story of a family that starts in France and on to America. A story of family loyalty, love, secrets and a darkness before once again seeing some brightness, light.While this story does work toward a unified whole. I did have some trouble with the way it is written. Short chapters often broke up an interesting narrative. The back and forth I often found confusing, frustrating. Still, this is an important work, and I liked that while it related war experiences, it focused on the individual, the family. In my readings this has been a rare occurrence. It features a remarkable woman at it's core and highlights the endurance of not on life, but the human experience as well.ARC from Edelweiss.