The Invisible Bridge by Julie Orringer

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The Invisible Bridge begins in 1937 and follows the fortunes of three Hungarian Jewish brothers – Andras, Tibor and Matyas Levi – as they try to survive in a Europe torn apart by World War II. At the beginning of the book, Andras is preparing to leave Budapest and go to Paris to study architecture. Soon after his arrival in France, Andras meets Klara Morgenstern, a woman nine years older than himself, a ballet teacher with a teenage daughter. Andras and Klara fall in love, but Klara has secrets in her past – secrets that she would prefer not to share with Andras.

Andras and Klara’s story is played out against a backdrop of wartime Paris, Budapest, Ukraine and parts of the Hungarian countryside. The complex relationship between Andras and Klara is always at the heart of the novel but to dismiss this book as just another romance is unfair because it’s so much more than that.

Despite reading a lot of novels set during World War II, this is the first one I’ve read that is told from a Hungarian perspective. Hungary was allied with Germany which meant this story approached things from a slightly different angle than most other books I’ve read about the war and as I knew almost nothing about the role Hungary played, I was able to learn a lot from this book. And of course, because Andras and his family are Jews the novel is very much from a Jewish viewpoint. We see how it grew increasingly dangerous to be a Jew living in wartime Europe and how the Levi family became desperate to escape to safety. And when eventually Hungary finds itself under German occupation, we see that the Hungarian Jews fared no better than Jews elsewhere in Europe.

I enjoyed this book but it wasn’t perfect. There were times when I thought the balance between the romance storyline and the war aspect wasn’t quite right. And some of the characters needed more depth. I really liked Andras at first as he was a character who was easy to like and sympathise with, but as the story went on I started to find him a little bit too perfect and after spending more than 600 pages with him I wished he’d had a few flaws just to make him more interesting. I also think it would have been a nice touch if part of the book had been written from another character’s point of view. Not really a criticism of the book – I just think it would have added another dimension to the story and with the book being so epic in scope, the opportunity was there to do this.

The biggest problem I had with the book was the length! I’m usually quite happy to immerse myself in a long book but unlike some stories which do take a long time to tell, I thought this one could easily have been a lot shorter. My attention started to wander somewhere in the middle of the book when a lot of time was spent describing Andras’s life in the forced labour service (Jews were no longer allowed to serve in the actual Hungarian army but instead were expected to do jobs such as felling trees and clearing minefields) but things did pick up again over the last hundred pages.

In fact, the final section of the book, with its descriptions of life in Budapest towards the end of the war is so compelling and filled with so much tension, it made it worth sticking with the book through the less interesting chapters in the middle. And of course, I was genuinely worried for some of the characters so I had to keep reading to make sure they survived to the end of the book! I thought Orringer did a good job of keeping us in suspense wondering who would live or die and despite the few minor negative points I’ve mentioned above, I loved The Invisible Bridge.

July Reading Summary

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Another month over and another ‘Reading Summary’. I loved so many of the books I read in July that I’ve found it almost impossible to choose just two or three favourites like I usually do…so instead I’ve chosen six.

Before I Go to Sleep by S.J. Watson – I was worried this book might not live up to the hype, but I loved it and couldn’t put it down.
Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy – one of the Hardy books I was most looking forward to reading and it didn’t disappoint.
Therese Raquin by Emile Zola – my first experience of Zola. I was very impressed and will definitely be reading more of his work.

I also read three books set during World War II and all three were among my favourite books of the month too.

The Novel in the Viola by Natasha Solomons – a great story about an Austrian girl working as a maid in England during the war.
The Invisible Bridge by Julie Orringer – I started reading this in June and finally finished it this month. It’s a long book but I thought it was definitely worth the time and effort.
Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford – I’d been wanting to read this one for ages, so I was pleased to find I loved it as much as I’d hoped I would!

Other books read this month:

The Somnambulist by Essie Fox
The Road to Wanting by Wendy Law-Yone
Powder and Patch by Georgette Heyer
The Swimmer by Roma Tearne
Burned by Thomas Enger
The Observations by Jane Harris
The Mystery of the Blue Train by Agatha Christie
The Birth of Love by Joanna Kavenna
The Secret Lives of Baba Segi’s Wives by Lola Shoneyin
The Champion by Elizabeth Chadwick

All outstanding reviews have been written and will hopefully be posted in the next few weeks, so you shouldn’t have long to wait to find out what I thought about all of these books.

What have you been reading in July? Which books do you hope to read in August?

Powder and Patch by Georgette Heyer

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Philip Jettan has grown up in the country on his family estate and has never shown any interest in fashionable society. As he grows older he falls in love with his childhood friend and neighbour, Cleone Charteris, but Cleone is unimpressed by Philip’s simple country ways and makes it clear she’s looking for a man with better manners and nicer clothes. And so, with the help of his Uncle Tom, Philip goes to Paris to learn how to be a gentleman…but when ‘le petite Philippe’ returns wearing powder and patches, writing French poetry and fighting duels, Cleone starts to wish she could have the old Philip back.

Powder and Patch is a very early Georgette Heyer novel and in my opinion not an example of her best work. If this had been my first experience of Heyer I think I would have been disappointed, but because I’ve read and enjoyed some of her other novels I’m prepared to accept that I’ll come across the occasional book that’s not as good. And having read some of her later books, it was interesting to see an early indication of her storytelling ability and talent for witty dialogue. There’s a lot of humour in the story but I didn’t find it as amusing as it was obviously intended to be – although I have to say, the final few chapters were quite funny and redeemed the book for me.

None of the characters in this book seemed to have much depth, with Cleone being particularly silly, especially in comparison to some of the stronger, more complex heroines in the other Heyer books I’ve read. I found it difficult to warm to her from the start because I thought Philip was fine the way he was: sincere, honest and reliable, and Cleone’s inability to accept him made me feel annoyed with her. The moral of the story is obvious: that outward appearances can be deceiving and it’s what’s inside that counts.

This book is set in the Georgian era, rather than the Regency period which Heyer is more famous for, and this gives the story a slightly different feel, although I don’t personally have any preference for one period over the other. I should point out that if you’re like me and have only a very basic knowledge of the French language (or none at all) be warned that there are a lot of French phrases scattered throughout the book, including an entire poem written in French. I don’t think it actually affected my understanding of the plot at all but I did keep wondering if I might be missing something.

Powder and Patch is a short novel but just the right length really because I don’t think the plot would have been strong enough to sustain a longer book. I found it a very quick and easy read which kept me entertained for a while, but definitely the weakest of the Heyer novels I’ve read so far.

I’m part of the Transworld Book Group!

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It’s time for the latest reading challenge from Transworld! Like their previous challenges (which included the 2010 Summer Reading Challenge and the Great Transworld Crime Caper) this one is open to EU residents only. You can choose four books from a list of fifteen and as you review each book, Transworld will send you the next one.

Here’s the list:

1. The Sandalwood Tree by Elle Newmark
2. Black Swan Rising by Lee Carroll
3. The Secrets Between Us by Louise Douglas
4. Teacher, Teacher! by Jack Sheffield
5. Death Sentence by Mikkel Birkegaard
6. Crippen by John Boyne
7. Caligula by Douglas Jackson
8. Twelve by Jasper Kent
9. The Obscure Logic of the Heart by Priya Basil
10. Nothing But Trouble by Rachel Gibson
11. The Colour of Death by Michael Cordy
12. Odin’s Mission by James Holland
13. Legacy by Danielle Steel
14. The Water Room by Christopher Fowler
15. The Bomber by Liza Marklund

If you live in the EU and you’d like to take part, all you need to do is leave a comment on Transworld’s blog, Between the Lines, and they will contact you to ask for your book selections and address.

So which books did I choose?


The Sandalwood Tree by Elle Newmark


The Secrets Between Us by Louise Douglas


The Water Room by Christopher Fowler


The Obscure Logic of the Heart by Priya Basil

Who else is taking part in this? What do you think of my choices?

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford

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One day in 1986 Henry Lee stands outside Seattle’s Panama Hotel. The building is being renovated and has been opened up for the first time in over forty years. As Henry watches, a number of items are carried up to the street. These things belonged to the Japanese American families who were ‘evacuated’ from their homes during the second world war. They had stored their possessions in the hotel basement but never came back to reclaim them. This is an important historical discovery, but for Henry it also has personal significance as it brings back memories of one particular Japanese family and a girl called Keiko…

Henry and Keiko are both just twelve years old when they become friends in 1942. He is the only Chinese boy and she the only Japanese girl in an all-white school. Unfortunately Henry’s father disapproves of their relationship – China and Japan have been involved in conflict for years and he considers all Japanese people to be the enemy. And with Pearl Harbor still fresh in people’s minds, Japan is America’s enemy too. Henry’s parents make him wear an “I am Chinese” button when he goes out in case anyone mistakes him for a Japanese boy. When the US government decide to round up thousands of Japanese people and send them to internment camps (allegedly to stop them from spying) Henry and Keiko find themselves separated.

The story of Henry and Keiko’s love and the fate of America’s Japanese population is just one part of Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet; the book also looks at the difficult relationship between Henry and his father, racial tensions in the 1940s, the Seattle jazz scene and the importance of music in our lives. The novel is heartbreaking in places and heartwarming in others (the ‘bitter and sweet’ of the title), yet it never became too sentimental for me. It’s a lovely, tender, moving story from beginning to end, but at the same time it’s a story that helps to educate the reader about an aspect of World War II that rarely seems to be given any attention today. I feel ashamed that I knew nothing about the way Japanese American people were treated during the war and I’m pleased that this gap in my knowledge has now been rectified somewhat.

So many of the books I’ve read recently have dual timeframes. In this book the narrative is split between 1942 and 1986, but for once I found both periods equally compelling to read about. As for the characters, the good ones are very good and the bad ones are very bad, yet they still feel like real, believable people rather than two-dimensional stereotypes. I really loved both Henry and Keiko. They were characters I genuinely cared about and I felt emotionally invested in their story, rather than just being a passive observer. And someone else who deserves a mention is Sheldon, a black saxophone player who becomes a friend of Henry’s, the type of friend I think we would all like to have!

As you might have guessed by now, I really loved this book – and I think it might even be one of my favourite books of the year so far. I had added it to my wish list as soon as it started appearing on so many American book blogs a couple of years ago and now that I’ve finally had a chance to read it for myself I’m so glad it was as good as I’d hoped it would be!

The Road to Wanting by Wendy Law-Yone

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In a hotel room in Wanting, a town on the borders of China and Burma, Na Ga is about to commit suicide. But when she’s interrupted by the hotel receptionist who tells her that her companion, Mr Jiang, has killed himself, Na Ga decides not to die just yet. Staying on alone in the hotel, she looks back on the circumstances that have led her to Wanting and begins to consider what she wants from her future.

Wendy Law-Yone instantly grabbed my attention with this fascinating and intriguing opening. The first chapter alone raised so many questions. Who is Na Ga and what is she doing in Wanting? What terrible things had happened in her life to cause her to want to kill herself? We do find out the answers to these questions, but only very slowly as Na Ga’s tragic story gradually unfolds.

We learn that Na Ga was born into Burma’s Wild Lu tribe and sold into slavery by her parents. From there, things go from bad to worse until she eventually ends up in Bangkok with her American lover, Will, who arranges for her to travel back to the village of her birth. The only problem is that Na Ga isn’t sure if she wants to go or not…and after years of conflict and unrest in Burma she doesn’t even know if her village still exists.

As you will have guessed, this is quite a bleak story but thankfully it’s not entirely without humour and lightness. Some of the lighter moments are provided by the character of Minzu, the happy, kind-hearted sixteen-year-old receptionist at the hotel in Wanting. Minzu is one of the few people who offers Na Ga genuine friendship and she brings a glimmer of hope and optimism to an otherwise harrowing story.

Na Ga herself could be a frustrating character at times, failing to take control of her own destiny and seeming to just accept all the bad things that happened to her, but I could see that much of her personality had been shaped by the abuse and neglect she was forced to endure over the years. She’d never had the freedom to choose what she wanted to do with her life. But while I did have a lot of sympathy for Na Ga, I was left feeling that I never really got to know her. I think the structure of the novel, interspersing the present day storyline with glimpses of Na Ga’s past, may have prevented me from becoming as fully absorbed in her story as I would have liked.

The Road to Wanting left me feeling saddened and angered. Some of the things that Na Ga experiences and witnesses are shocking and by the end of the novel I could understand what had driven her to consider suicide. The lack of connection I felt with Na Ga as a character is the only negative thing I can say about this excellent book.

The Novel in the Viola by Natasha Solomons

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I love reading fiction set during World War II and The Novel in the Viola is one of the best I’ve read for a while. The story begins in 1938 when we meet nineteen-year-old Elise Landau, a girl from a rich Austrian family (her mother, Anna, is a successful opera singer and her father, Julian, a famous author). Until now, Elise has lead a secure and comfortable life but that’s all about to change because the Landaus are Jews, and with Europe on the brink of war Austria is no longer a safe place to live. And so Elise is sent away from her home in Vienna and travels alone to Tyneford House, a mansion on the south coast of England, where she will work as a maid for Mr Rivers and his son, Kit. Her parents have remained in Austria while they await American visas and they promise to send for Elise as soon as possible – but as the war continues, she begins to wonder if they’ll ever be reunited.

The portrayal of life in an English country house forms a big part of the story, with insights into the class system, social conventions of the time, and the relationships between servant and master. Elise has to get used to working as a parlour maid after spending most of her life having servants of her own. Her background makes it difficult for her to fit in with the other servants at Tyneford but her status as a maid and a Jewish refugee prevents her from being accepted by some of the Rivers’ upper class friends. Elise is a wonderful character and I enjoyed following her as she settled into her new life – I thought Natasha Solomons displayed a real understanding of what it was like to be newly arrived in an unfamiliar country, feeling homesick and struggling with the language and the culture.

There are lots of beautiful, atmospheric descriptions of the Dorset countryside and coast which gave me a true feel of what it was like to live there during the Second World War. The story also looks at the effects the war had on the village of Tyneford and the house itself. The author’s note at the end of the book was very interesting and explained how Tyneford was based on a real place that became a ghost town because of the war.

There are so many other things I could say about this book – there’s the secret of the ‘novel in the viola’ itself, and I haven’t even mentioned yet the romantic storyline which develops as Elise begins to fall in love with someone she meets at Tyneford. But I don’t want to spoil this book for you, so I’ll just say that The Novel in the Viola was a real pleasure to read, a great story with just the right balance of sadness and humour. And I thought the way the book ended was perfect – the only problem was that I had grown to care for Elise and the others so much I didn’t want to leave them behind.