4.5 for me.

This book is not what I expected.

Their is such a realism to the book, the characters are all strong even if not likable.

The story is told from 3 different characters, 2 , Karl and Marijke during World War 2 and the Nazi concentration camps . The 3rd character is Luciano a captive during the Argentine Dirty War in the 1977 era. I must admit I knew little of that era.

You want to find out what happens to the 3 of them. Can their be forgiveness after such atrocities, how do you learn to live again.

The book was well written and drew you in from page 1

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for my advanced copy. I saw that the book was out in Canada when I was half way through my ebook so I went and bought my own copy.

This story will stay with you for a longtime.

Absolutely LOVED this book!!! Marijke's story was my favorite. It was heartbreaking and I may have teared up at a few spots. She did what was needed to survive. I kept hoping she would live to see the liberation of the camp.

The book alternates between Marijke, Karl and Luciano and is primarily set during WWII. Marijke is a Dutch political prisoner of the Nazis. She ends up working at the prisoner brothel in Buchenwald. She sees this as her only chance to survive in the camps. Marijke never gives up hope of being reunited with her husband. Karl Müller is the new Schutzhaftlagerführer at Buchenwald and ends up falling in love with Marijke. At times I liked Karl. He helped Marijke survive and was even loving towards her and at times he felt bad for the people at the camp. But honestly he was a horrible person and was the cause of so many deaths even if he personally didn't kill them. I think he did struggle with his position at the camp and would have rather been a biologist. In the end he finally got what he deserved, but it was nothing compared to what the people in the camps endured. Luciano's story takes place in 1977 while he is a college student in Argentina, living with his parents. He is kidnapped and tortured for being involved in protests. He always felt like his father was ashamed of him.

I loved the story , characters and writing style. The torture that Luciano endured was sometimes hard to read about. I never knew there were brothels at the camps for the privileged prisoners or even the SS officers. I can't imagine what the woman endured. I also never knew that Buchenwald had a zoo. I didn't want Marijke's story to end. I wanted to keep reading about her life.

I definitely recommend this book. It was a wonderful read. I look forward to reading more books by the author.

Thanks to NetGalley, HARLEQUIN – Trade Publishing (U.S. & Canada) and the author, Ellen Keith, for a free electronic ARC of this novel.

This is a historical fiction novel. Even though, it is based on fact. This novel is about a young Dutch women and her husband. They are caught helping Jews. Thus, they are separated and sent to a concentration camp. Hoping to be near her husband, she is recruited to be a prostitute for the prisoners who had earned a special privilege. Meanwhile, a young man is taken from his home, never to return. He is one of the disappeared. The detail of all areas of a concentration camp, and how it works, is shared in detail. The living conditions, food rations, punishments, of the prisoners as opposed to the officers is stark.
This a wonderfully written story. It's contents are sad and heartbreaking, but it happened.
The characters are portrayed as real people, with thoughts and emotions. I highly recommend this book. Brilliant!

Heartbreaking and scary. Who knows what any of us might be capable of doing during evil times? Pray we're never tested.

The Dutch Wife is a Historical Fiction novel that tells the story of three people during WWII in dual story lines. The reader is privy to the points of view of Marijke de Graaf, a Dutch prisoner in the Buchenwald concentration camp and SS officer Karl Muller whose job it is to run the camp. The other story line, decades later, follows a young man named Luciano Wagner in Buenos Aires.

I'm all for dual story lines in books. I like getting a better look into different characters but the story lines weren't balanced well here. Luciano's POV felt so different and vague compared to the other two that I struggled to stay interested. Readers are kept in the dark (much like Luciano himself) about how Luciano fits into the main story line and it was frustrating being strung along for so much of the book. When the answers are finally given, it's late in the story and the connection wasn't much of a surprise.

As a big reader of WWII fiction, I always welcome learning more about it. Keith taught me about aspects of life within the concentration camp that I hadn't known before, specifically for non-Jewish women. But I wanted more depth, stronger character development and more backstory, especially for Marijke. Why was she involved in the Resistance? And I could have done without the romance angle which felt sudden, more than a little icky and I didn't feel I was given enough reasons to get behind it. With these issues and the abrupt ending leaving readers with unanswered questions, I thought The Dutch Wife was an okay, lighter Historical Fiction read, but not a book I'd be encouraging everyone to pick up.

What an intense book! It was well written but the subject matter is so heavy that it's hard to know what to say about it. I found myself skimming Luciano's chapters as they were even more depressing than the chapters set in the concentration camp.

The epilogue was poetic justice.

(edit: I've heard some people say this is a romance. It is 100% NOT a romance. Just FYI.)

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC.

I had heard so much buzz about this book (Brand new novelist! Canadian author! Riveting premise for a book!).

When I started the book, I was cautiously optimistic about how it was going to go.
I couldn't have been more wrong.
I had to force myself to finish this book even though historical fiction (and especially war time fiction) is my favourite genre.
I wanted to like Marijke - but she felt like a caricature of a Dutch resistance fighter rather than a real one.
The blips to Argentina were puzzling at best and I had no idea why they were included (other than to state the obvious that Luciano was Karl's son).

I was so heartily disappointed in this book. Maybe I was expecting a Kristin Hannah "The Nightingale" sort of book and that's why I was disappointed, but I just felt it was too trite, too superficial and not real enough.