Charlotte Gray

Rating:
Summary: Faulks has done it again!
Review: Charlotte Gray is a wonderful sequel to Birdsong. It is true that is does not quite reach the emotional intensity of its predecessor, but it is still a great book, thunderously entertaining. Faulks is an inspired writer who can flesh out complex characters in an amazing way.

Of course, there were parts of the novel that I liked more than others. I didn't care much about the conflict between Charlotte and her father, or the way it was resolved. I also felt that the pace of the novel is uneven, slow at first but gradually increasing until the frenzy of the last section. Faulks does better when he recreates the atmosphere of the occupied French town. Of all the characters, I found Julien the most interesting, and Andre and Jacob's story completely drained me emotionally. I also loved how Faulks included references and characters from The Girl at the Lion d'Or and Birdsong.

For people who would like to know more about the activities of the English SOE agents in France, I heartily recommend reading " A Quiet Courage", by Liane Jones (unfortunately out of print according to Amazon.com). This book is a real account of the activities of the English women sent as agents during World War II to France to help organise French resistance.

For an entertaining and involving read, try Charlotte Gray. You won't be disappointed!

Rating:
Summary: Birdsong still shines through the Gray clouds.
Review: I have had to reflect upon Faulks' 'Charlotte Gray' for some time to refrain from critcising it unduly. This is, quite genuinely, a convincing and well-woven story that will greatly appeal to first time readers of Faulks, yet still it may be a slight disappointment to those who have read 'Birdsong'.

In itself, 'Charlotte Gray' is an accomplished novel by a gifted storyteller. - Our eponymous heroine is a complex and fairly intriuging lady, but in my opinion was less well conceived than the characters who accompany her in wartime France. The Jewish father and son, who aid Charlotte in the Resistance and in her search for her missing lover, are particularly compelling.

In criticism, the concentration camps present in 'Charlotte Gray' would have benefited from the visceral style Faulks' employed in his description of the First World War trenches of 'Birdsong'. Unfortunately, the horrors of the Second World War are not described with the clarity or power present in his earlier book.

Rating:
Summary: A Heroine of Emotion and Intelligence
Review: Sebastian Faulks gives us a heroine to admire in the title character of Charlotte Gray, a Scottish-English woman drawn into covert intrigue in World War II France.

Charlotte, like so many ordinary people, is made remarkable by the war and situations that would be wholly uncommon in peacetime. Her personal resolve to be directly useful to the war effort prompts her to leave her job as a secretary and to become an undercover operative for the British in France.

However, it's not the secret identities and undercover maneuverings that most convince the reader of Charlotte's heroism. It's her intense involvement with RAF pilot Peter Gregory who goes missing in action. Without sentimentalizing, she sees her feelings for Gregory as transcendent and is willing to see it through to the end.

It's a crazy thing to persist in love in the middle of the war and in the midst of being an undercover operative. Readers well recognize the romantic cliché of women waiting for their lost men. In Charlotte however, our faith is renewed, our jadedness set aside.

Rating:
Summary: Sebastian goes schizophrenic- again.
Review: The heroine is soggy bog wet, the writing around her turgid and pointless. Her predicaments are unbelievable and her actions self centred and insular. World War Two- it feels more like a tiff over the pronunciation of scones at The Ritz between some high society toffs.

The sub story of two Jewish children and their fate is as good as any I have ever read. (The fact that I have two children of similar age could be a factor here.) World War Two now feels like a Europe wide sea of blood and fear, where nothing is sacrosanct.

A schizophrenic story- as in Birdsong the question that has to be answered is "where was the editor" to cut out all of the romantic pap that drags this book down?

I took a look at the reviews of "On Green Dolphin Street"- the editor seems more absent than ever. What a waste of a talented writer.

Rating:
Summary: A Chilling Truth Of The Holocaust Rarely Bettered
Review: The story of Charlotte is peripheral to the eventual all-pervading horror of the treatment of Andre and Jacob. In its never-ending awfulness, you want, desperately, to reach into the book and save them. Of course you cannot and so are but a helpless observer as they pass from one hell to a worse one and then on to their deaths. I have never felt so emotionally drained by a book. I now carry these images with me. I wish I didn't but I know I, and everyone else, should. The final 150 pages are very difficult to come to terms with. But then, why should we ever find it easy to come to terms with genocide?
"It's only a story," someone said to me. Except, of course, it is anything but.

Rating:
Summary: Could not put it down!
Review: This one was my personal favorite of the trilogy. Eventhough I felt little connection with Charlotte, her perils kept me reading. The subplot of Andre, Jacob and Levade certainly stole the show. Faulks seems always to beautifully represent unjust and tragic contrasts of society during war. The historical detail is rich and convincing. I wish he would now write from a Jewish perspective.