Night Train to Marrakech is the third and final book in Dinah Jefferies’ Daughters of War trilogy, but if you haven’t read the previous two books that shouldn’t be a problem as I think this one would also work well as a standalone. While Daughters of War and The Hidden Palace followed the stories of the three Baudin sisters, Hélène, Élise and Florence, during World War II, this third novel moves forward to the 1960s to focus on Élise’s daughter, Vicky.
In July 1966, Vicky Baudin arrives in Morocco to visit her grandmother for the first time. Having lost her father during the war, Vicky has only recently discovered that his mother, Clemence, is still alive and living in the mountains outside Marrakech. Vicky has just received a diploma in fashion design from a London art college, so this seems like a good time to travel abroad before beginning a postgraduate course in Paris. As her train arrives at Marrakech station, Vicky is looking forward to getting to know Clemence – and is determined to find a way to meet her hero, the French designer Yves Saint Laurent, who also lives in Marrakech.
In her mountain home, the Kasbah du Paradis, Clemence is awaiting her long-lost granddaughter’s arrival with mixed emotions. Vicky will want to know why she played no part in her son’s life and Clemence doesn’t feel ready to explain. However, she’s forced to confront the memories she’s tried so hard to forget when a man from her past reappears, threatening to reveal her secrets. Meanwhile, Vicky and her cousin Bea also stumble into trouble when they become witnesses to a crime.
Night Train to Marrakech has a much stronger thriller element than the previous two books, which I found quite surprising. The novel is set against a backdrop of rising political tensions – a few months before the novel begins, the Moroccan revolutionary Mehdi Ben Barka is abducted in Paris (a real life incident) – and although this doesn’t form a large part of the plot, it does give a sense of the danger for two young women who unintentionally become mixed up in a situation they don’t fully understand. The descriptions of Morocco itself – the scenery, the buildings, the food, the sounds and smells – are also beautifully done.
The three sisters from the first two books (Vicky’s mother, Élise, and her two aunts, Hélène and Florence) do eventually make an appearance in this one, but I was disappointed that we don’t see very much of them. This is very much Vicky’s story and Clemence’s, and although having two completely new characters to get to know so late in the trilogy unsettled me slightly, I did warm to them later in the book. I found Clemence in particular an intriguing character as she seems so cold and secretive at first but as more and more of her story unfolds, the reason for this becomes clear and by the end of the book I had gained a lot of respect and sympathy for her.
I didn’t enjoy this book as much as Daughters of War and The Hidden Palace – as the third in a trilogy I would have preferred it to be more closely linked with the first two books rather than moving on to the next generation – but the gripping plot and evocative setting still made it worthwhile. As for whether or not Vicky achieves her dream of meeting Yves Saint Laurent, you’ll have to read the book to find out!
Thanks to HarperCollins for providing a copy of this book for review via NetGalley.
This is book 40/50 for the 2023 Historical Fiction Reading Challenge.
She Reads Novels 