By Erica and Karen

We spent a lot of reading hours over the past year on serious topics, particularly history and race, to learn, to see things from different perspectives, and to figure out how and why we can be hopeful for our collective future. From Obama’s The Promised Land, to Professor Glaude’s Begin Again bringing James Baldwin’s lessons to our times, to the disturbing Isabel Wilkerson’s Caste, we’ve been immersed in reading more for discomfort than for pure recreational pleasure.

With the sun shining and smiles occasionally unmasked, though, we’re ready to take a mental break and get a jump start on our somewhat trashy summer reads. Perhaps not surprisingly for this genre, these early ones have something in common: they are all told in dual timelines, one anchored in today and the other in and around World War II. You will likely learn something you didn’t know—the meaning of “ the offing,” the existence of the heroic librarians in Paris. But these are books for stories. We especially recommend the first two. The others are sufficiently well written to be a decent, if not great, read.

The Offing by Benjamin Myers. About a young man from a mining village who sets off on a coastal walk after the second world war and discovers an older woman whose cottage by the sea, secrets and generosity in food, wine and friendship provide the key to his life. It’s a wonderful story, beautifully written. Enjoy.

The Rose Code by Kate Quinn. Another engaging WW II story, this one historical fiction about three women Enigma Code breakers in Bletchley Park who became like sisters but were wrenched apart by a mysterious traitor. They come together again after the war to break this final code. One of the women is based on Prince Philip’s real life girlfriend before he met the soon to be Queen. If you liked Quinn’s The Alice Network and The Huntress, you will like this one too.

The Venice Sketchbook by Rhys Bowen. Left some keys, a sketch book and a dying wish by her great aunt, a young woman embarks upon a journey to Venice to discover her aunt’s secrets and her newly divorced self. The evocative descriptions of Venice both before the war and today whet our appetites for getting back there as soon as we can. We’ve come to expect this largely algorithmic genre for what it is, so this one did not disappoint in that respect.

The Paris Library by Janet Skeslien Charles. Like The Rose Code, this is historical fiction based on the brave women librarians who kept The American Library in Paris open during the German occupation. The stories are true--librarians who clandestinely delivered books to French and British troops and to Jews and the legendary director Dorothy Reader and the Comtesse de Chambrun who heroically defied the Nazis and kept the doors open. It’s a slow go at times, and the ending may be disappointing, but the stories of brave women always engage and strike an important note.