Suite Francaise

The second world war classic of life under Nazi occupation. N¿rovsky was sent to Auschwitz in 1942.

In 1941, Ir¿ sat down to write a book that would convey the magnitude of what she was living through by evoking the domestic lives and personal trials of the ordinary citizens of France. N¿rovsky''s death in Auschwitz in 1942 prevented her from seeing the day, sixty-five years later, that the existing two sections of her planned novel sequence, Suite Fran¿se, would be rediscovered and hailed as a masterpiece.

Set during the year that France fell to the Nazis, Suite Fran¿se falls into two parts. The first is a brilliant depiction of a group of Parisians as they flee the Nazi invasion; the second follows the inhabitants of a small rural community under occupation. Suite Fran¿se is a novel that teems with wonderful characters struggling with the new regime. However, amidst the mess of defeat, and all the hypocrisy and compromise, there is hope.