Happy Friday, everyone! Today I have a special treat for you. I will be posting three reviews of three…novelettes, I suppose you can call them…all from the same series. The first novelette is Down the Rabbit Hole: Into France by Jason Walker.
Bordeaux, France, 1943. The world has become engulfed by the terror that is World War II. France has been subjected to Nazi rule, and the country’s citizens are helpless to resist. At least, so it seems. Among the frightened French citizens are a brave few, both Resistance members and secret agents, all risking their lives to aid the Allies in any way they can. Bridgette LeClair and her daughter, Danielle, are two such courageous women. As Danielle serves as a spy for the British, Bridgette hides away two recently-escaped POWs. They’ve avoided detection so far, but as the Gestapo encroach more and more upon their small town and the surrounding area in search of POW escapees, their safety becomes flimsy at best.
How long will Danielle and Bridgette be able to hold their own against the Nazis? Will the Allied Forces rescue the POWs before the Gestapo get to them? And will they be able to save one of the POWs who failed to escape? More importantly, why is it so imperative that they free this particular soldier?
As part of a larger series, this novelette does not answer all of these questions. In fact, it raises more questions than it answers, and that might be the biggest draw of Into France for me. (Well, besides the strong female leads and historical setting.) While the series is based on real events, Walker constructs a narrative filled with intrigue, tension, and mystery.
Rather than reading like a book in a series, this novelette more reads like a TV episode. Walker writes in prose, like a story, but the structure and suspense more closely mimic TV shows. That style does not detract from the quality of the story; rather, it’s just an approach to which I am not accustomed. Give how integral TV has become to our lives, this episodic technique might garner even more interesting than a normal book series.
While multiple sections contain detailed depictions of scenery, Walker’s overall writing comes across as minimalistic. Much like Hemingway, Walker only paints those images which are necessary to set a mood or establish a character or setting. Sometimes this leads to more exposition than I would like, especially when introducing a new character, but that’s just a minor issue for someone like me. (It’s a fault that I find in Hemingway’s work as well, so I guess it just comes with the minimalist territory.) This exposition never distracted me for long, so it’s more of an annoyance than a flaw in the writing.
A fairly large cast of characters—not for novels but for a novelette this short—weaves in and out of this narrative, providing both a wide variety of personalities and a broadened view of different experiences of Allied Forces in World War II. We have Danielle, a spy for the British who has had trouble with the Gestapo; Bridgette, Danielle’s mother, a baker, and a French native who is hiding POW escapees; MacArthur, an escaped and lovesick POW from Canada hiding out with Bridgette; and Vera Atkins, the tough-as-nails head of Britain’s Special Operations.
While the male POWs and their rescuers provided the necessary central plot (as well as some much-needed humor), I was more captivated by Bridgette, Danielle, and Atkins. Women’s roles in World War II are too-often overlooked, and these characters make sure to highlight that little-known part of history. Better yet, while all are determined and tough in their own way, not all of the female leads are the cold-hearted, hard-to-break stereotype we usually see cast as the “strong” woman in fiction. Danielle and Bridgette have tender hearts which they open up to each other. Even Atkins, while she certainly has a hard, protective shell, she does not seem entirely cold-hearted; she, like Danielle and Bridgette, just feels human, a human put in a very tough and soul-shattering situation.
Of course, some of the characters are stereotypical, namely the Nazis. I understand the approach Walker takes to the German soldiers. After all, they did a lot of despicable things that cannot be understood by a rational, caring human being. However, the image of the Nazis in this novelette remind me of many, many other depictions in books and movies. On the one hand, this could just be a result of these soldiers really acting so despicably. We are all capable of great evil, especially when it’s justified by one’s government. It would also be bordering on another stereotype to follow the route of a Nazi soldier who felt like he was dying on the inside from all of this and defies his superiors. On the other hand, it’s hard to swallow that all of them could have been so heartless. Still, even with my desire to see three-dimensional characters, these soldiers are villains and so should be depicted as such. It’s a toss-up, really.
Overall, Into France by Jason Walker is a captivating and thrilling novelette. I love the historical context as well as the care Walker obviously put into researching the events depicted. The characters are very real and, while most are typical for this genre, the strong female leads are very refreshing. The ending left me hanging with many more questions than answers. However, that’s the point. Readers just need to continue to the next novelette in order to see what happens next. While the novelette form has gotten a bad rep lately, I think this one is perfect for killing time before your appointment or while riding on the bus to work, and I recommend it to anyone who loves history, spies, and strong female leads.
You can buy Into France by Jason Walker as an eBook and in print on Amazon. To learn more about the author and his other works, be sure to check out his website.
Do you know of any books I should read? E-mail me at thewritersscrapbin@gmail.com and let me know!
Designed by Stephanie Hoogstad circa 2011