From the bestselling author of The Book of Lost Names comes a gripping historical novel about two mothers who must make unthinkable choices in the face of the Nazi occupation.

Paris, 1939: Young mothers Elise and Juliette become fast friends the day they meet in the beautiful Bois de Boulogne. Though there is a shadow of war creeping across Europe, neither woman suspects that their lives are about to irrevocably change.

When Elise becomes a target of the German occupation, she entrusts Juliette with the most precious thing in her life—her young daughter, playmate to Juliette’s own little girl. But nowhere is safe in war, not even a quiet little bookshop like Juliette’s Librairie des Rêves, and, when a bomb falls on their neighborhood, Juliette’s world is destroyed along with it.

More than a year later, with the war finally ending, Elise returns to reunite with her daughter, only to find her friend’s bookstore reduced to rubble—and Juliette nowhere to be found. What happened to her daughter in those last, terrible moments? Juliette has seemingly vanished without a trace, taking all the answers with her. Elise’s desperate search leads her to New York—and to Juliette—one final, fateful time.

The Paris Daughter is a sweeping celebration of resilience, motherhood, and love.

Review:

Enthralling, poignant, and atmospheric!

The Paris Daughter is an alluring, heart-wrenching tale predominantly set in Paris and New York City between 1939 and the early 1960s that takes you into the life of a handful of people whose lives are unimaginably changed when a young woman, Elise LeClair, decides to leave her daughter for the remainder of the war in the safe hands of her best friend Juliette only to learn upon her return that the bookshop where the family of six had presided was accidentally bombed during an afternoon raid leaving behind ash, ruins, devastation, and only two living souls.

The prose is fluid and exquisite. The characters are tormented, brave, and resilient. And the plot, including all the subplots, unravel and intertwine seamlessly into an absorbing tale of life, loss, family, tragedy, desperation, secrets, friendship, motherhood, separation, and war.

Overall, The Paris Daughter is one of those novels that sweeps you away so thoroughly to another time and place that before you know it you’re turning the final page and the afternoon is gone. It’s a charged, moving, impactful tale by Harmel that does a beautiful job of reminding us that a mother’s love is all-encompassing, selfless, powerful, and everlasting.

This novel is available now.

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