Daughters of War (Dinah Jefferies) [Daughters of War #1]

Three sisters – Hélène, Elise and Florence – live in a beautiful little house away from Sainte Cécile, a village in Dordogne, not too far from Sarlat. They moved when their father passed away and have remained there because of the Second World War. We are now in 1944 and the three sisters are longing for the end of the war. But the months prior to the liberation are very difficult in occupied France. The resistance is very active and many actions take place against the occupying forces in preparation for the landing of the Allied forces. The three sisters all suffer through the events, loose loved ones, experience horrific times, throw themselves into their activities and find their own way to cope with these awful times.
The book is full of interesting and strong characters: the three sisters of course, their friends Violette and Lucille, Hugo the doctor and his wife Marie, resistance fighters Jack, Victor and many others, Captain Meyer, Thomas and Anton. Through her research and empathy, Dinah Jefferies succeeded to recreate in her book the atmosphere in the village during these troubled times. Living in an occupied country was immensely complex and relationships between people that used to be friends or simply inhabitants of the same village also became complex. Not only the French were divided between those supporting Vichy, those fighting the occupant with any means they had and those just trying to get one with their lives. But also the German occupants were torn, many of them drawn to sympathise with the villagers, while some such as the division Das Reich perpetrated some of cruelest massacres during their retreat, such as the one in Tulle mentioned in the book. This complexity of situation, politics, relationships and emotions during these times in France is very seldom well addressed in British novels, but here it is done with deep sensitivity and empathy.
In the background, I enjoyed the descriptions of the location in Dordogne, walking in the woods, sitting in the sun, listening to the birds. In spite of the tension of those days, the sisters’s house always feels like a cosy and peaceful place, where sister Florence even manages to continue to maintain the culinary traditions, although with very different ingredients.
I really enjoyed this book and I am glad this is a trilogy, as I cannot wait to read the rest of the story.