I don't know why I continue to read World War II books. They are heartbreaking and cruel. I guess I am drawn to them in an effort not to forget, to never forget. Pam Jenoff's latest novel includes depressing tragedies but also hope and love.

The Woman with the Blue Star is set in 1942 Poland. The war rages on and the Germans begin to clear out the ghetto and remove any Jews. Sadie and her family escape to the sewers so they will not be taken away. But they didn't realize they would have to stay in the servers until the was over. Above ground, Ella is an affluent Pole with a horrible foster mother. As she escapes to the furthest shops, she meets a girl looking through a grate. From then on Ella and Sadie are fast friends and prove that bravery isn't just fighting in the war.

Jenoff spins another tail of women's strength during times of war. The Lost Girls of Paris had the same themes blending tragedy and heart which is the calling card of Jenoff as I have come to see while reading The Woman with the Blue Stars. (This book is actually better than the older one. There is a more satisfying ending.)

Jenoff starts with a true story and spins a beautiful yarn. There is so much sadness and the mood is desperate and panicky. There's more to the story than just living in the sewer. The author connects the characters with relationships allowing them to grow in an isolated area. Ella's story shows another side of the war, especially since her foster mother is working directly with the Germans. Typical family struggles make the book especial empathetic. For many, it's hard to identify with such characters but the addition of relations and strife within is something everyone can understand allowing them to imagine themselves in the sewer.

Better than other books by this author, The Woman with the Blue Star is heartbreaking but gives you hope. It's that hope that keeps me reading these kinds of stories.

The Woman With The Blue Star
Pam Jenoff

Pam Jenoff’s latest WWII historical fiction is a chilling reminder of the horrors suffered at the malevolent hands of the Nazis and their collaborators against Jews and those who had the courage to fight them and that even in the face of such abhorrence there were still amazing stories of heroism and survival. The Woman With The Blue Star is one of those stories, one that will stay with readers long after the last page has been read.

Sadie Gault and her parents were living in the Warsaw Ghetto after the Nazis made them leave their home until one night the Germans came to evict all the Jews living in the Ghetto. Then Sadie, her father and pregnant mother along with others escaped to the sewers under the city where trying to survive they faced one nightmare after another. Then one day while exploring her new underground home Sadie looks up through a grate and sees a beautiful young woman about her age.

Ella Stepanek lives in the wealthy part of Warsaw with her stepmother who after her father’s death kept her status by collaborating with the Nazis and as horrified as Ella was by her stepmother’s behavior she kept quiet because she didn’t have anywhere else to go. Then she meets a girl living in a sewer trying to evade the Nazis and Ella suddenly has something she can do to make a difference.

With lifelike characters that will pop off the page, a vividly descriptive flowing narrative that will bring the sights, sounds, horrors and the heroisms of 1940s war torn Poland to life and an OMG ending gifted storyteller Pam Jenoff tells her story of two very different young women, an unlikely pair who epitomize courage and heroism and the real reason good won over evil in WWII. She will also introduce her audience to the people who stood by and did nothing, to people who helped spread the evil and to the brave people who gave their all and in many instances paid the ultimate sacrifice to defeat the Nazis and will leave her readers wondering, what would I have done in this situation?

WWII fiction is so important because of how few are left who lived through these times so we rely on those rare authors like Pam Jenoff who can bring them to life and remind us just how fragile freedom and democracy are.
Fans of WWII era fiction and of this prolific author will find this novel impossible to put down.

Pam Jenoff is a master storyteller, and The Woman With the Blue Star is no exception. I had read bits and pieces about surviving the holocaust in the tunnels below, but never like this. Heartbreaking and beautifully written.

Jenoff’s vivid and transporting story of friendship between two young women in Nazi-occupied Poland offers a nuance representation of loss and hope during a moment of history will both overwhelming darkness and beacons of humanity among individuals willing to take risks for one another. The characters’ optimism against their odds is refreshing, and while the story captures the violent and bleak realities of that time, it also focuses on hope, love, and friendship. This moving novel is worth the read and is a standout within the World War II historical fiction genre.

What an amazing and heartbreaking historical fiction book by author Pam Jenoff. Sadie and her family are forced to live in a ghetto in Krakow Poland as the country is under German control in WW11. Ella is living in Krakow and is living with her overbearing step mother in her family home. To further hide from the German’s Sadie and her mother have to flee to the underground sewers with another family. It is unbelievable that people had to go to such lengths to survive and unfortunately these are the horrors of war. By chance one day Ella sees Sadie through a sewer grate. A wonderful friendship forms and Ella risks her own safety to help Sadie. Both of these woman showed resilience, loyalty, and immense bravery. I was completely absorbed in this book and I highly recommend it if you like historical fiction.

I love that through reading historical fiction my eyes are continually being opened to new facets of history, especially WWII history. This story takes place in occupied Krakow and follows Sadie, Jewish girl, who has to go hide in the sewers, and Ella, a privileged Polish girl, who finds herself in a situation she never imagined. These girls end up with their lives intertwined and are set on a path that is life threatening and will definitely change their lives forever.

I really felt like I was walking these tunnels and streets with these characters and I felt their emotions alongside them. The ending was everything I needed it to be. This story will be one that stays with you.

Content Warning: Death, Oppression, and Violence associated with German-Occupied Poland

Another great book by Pam Jenoff. Historical fiction set in WWII can be overwhelming at times but this book gave me a wonderful feeling of hope even in isolation. Even in the toughest of times when life can be scary, there are people that help each other even though it might be a risk to their own life. This is a survival story. The isolation the characters feel as they hide together reminded me a little of what people experienced with COVID lockdowns in the past year. If these people can find hope and help each other and endure—- I can too! My situation is not as difficult as Sadie’s. However I want to believe I would seek to help others, too—-no matter what. A great read! Thanks Net Galley for the advance eBook!!!

This is a historical fiction inspired by the true story of a small group of Jews who survived WWII by living in the sewers of Lviv, Poland. While life became more and more difficult for the people of Poland, it was much, much worse for the Jews who lived in the sewers. The constant horrendous smells, the disease-infested waters, the constant wet feet - all this is just unimaginable and a sign of their desperation to survive.

Set in 1942, eighteen-year-old Sadie Gault, along with her father and pregnant mother and another family, relocate from the Kraków Ghetto to the sewers when the Nazis liquidate the ghetto. One day as Sadie is walking the sewer tunnels, she looks up through a grate and sees a girl about her own age.

Ella Stepanek, a Polish girl, lives an affluent life with her stepmother, who has relationships with the occupying Germans. One day as she is shopping in the market, she catches a glimpse of a girl beneath a grate in the street. Thus begins a remarkable friendship.

This is a story of family, loss, friendship, trust, sacrifice, and even love. The part I found most interesting was the developing relationship between a nonobservant Jewish family and a religious Jewish family forced to live in a confined space. I also loved the friendship that developed between Sadie and Ella.

The story pulled me right in, and I found it extremely hard to put the book down. The characters are realistic. I found the lives of both female protagonists interesting – how Sadie manages living in the sewers, and the risks Ella takes to meet with Sadie and provide her aid.

The story is very emotional and gives witness to the extraordinary strength of the human will to survive. It will leave readers with a great deal to think about.

I'm always on the look out for new WWII historical fiction as it's a time period that I've been interested in ever since my first history lessons on the topic. Add that I've read and enjoyed Pam Jenoff's writing in the past, and joining the blog tour for her newest story The Woman With The Blue Star was an easy choice... And I'm glad I did, because this turned out to be yet another excellent piece of WWII historical fiction.

The first thing that stands out for me is the setting in Kraków. I've been lucky enough to visit the city (as well as the Auschwitz camps) in 2018 and both had a big impact on me. The Old Town, the Rynek, the Barbican, the Wawel castle, the Jewish quarter... The descriptions in The Woman With The Blue Star really made the different sights come alive again and it was really easy to picture the characters walking the streets of Kraków. I could especially appreciate descriptions of occupied Kraków and what life was like for both Jews in hiding as well as other Poles during that time. It's the focus on the ordinary and the day to day survival that took the story to the next level for me.

The story is mainly set in the past, although The Woman With The Blue Star both starts and ends in the present. I'm glad this story didn't have a full blown dual timeline though, as I tend to prefer the past timeline in the first place and I feel that this story now gives us the best of both worlds. The story in occupied Kraków is told switching between two different POVs: the Jewish girl Sadie Gault and the rich Polish girl Ella Stepanek. Through their eyes we get to see how the occupation affects the Polish population in different ways, and especially Sadie's chapters were both harrowing and heartbreaking. It was intriguing to see the two storylines connect and develop though, and my heart went out to both of them as they were fighting to survive.

The characters were easy to connect to and their development was both realistic and thorough. Sadie's background and story might have a bigger impact, but it is the contrast to Ella's situation that makes the story stand out and I liked how both their stories developed over time. Moments of hope and light are mixed with despair, danger and fear, and The Woman With The Blue Star most definitely isn't a happy read. Then again, it's not something you would suspect from WWII fiction in the first place... The writing itself is beautiful and managed to grab me from the very first chapter, and I really liked how everything wrapped up in the end.

In short, The Woman With The Blue Star is a beautifully rendered and harrowing piece of WWII fiction that will speak to fans of the genre.  Recommended!

Imagine if you were given the opportunity to survive and escape the brutality of the Nazis. Would you sign on even if it meant putting up with deplorable living conditions, constant fear of being discovered and the ultimate loss of loved ones? That was what eighteen year old Sadie Gault and her parents chose to do in Pam Jenoff’s newest novel, The Woman With the Blue Star. Sadie grew up in Krakow, Poland and enjoyed a peaceful and fulfilling life there with her parents, friends, family and teachers until the Germans arrived. Sadie and her parents were Jewish and so their lives changed drastically after the Nazis arrived but they still had each other. They were forced to abandon their home and move into the Krakow Jewish ghetto. Things for the Jewish families in the ghetto progressively got worse and worse. One day, the Nazis decided to raid some of the houses in the ghetto. All the grown-ups were at work. The Nazis came and rounded up the unsuspecting and innocent children. Sadie heard the soldiers approaching and decided to hide in a chest in her parents bedroom. When Sadie’s parents came home from work they discovered what had happened. Sadie was an only child and was loved dearly by both her parents. When her parents could not find Sadie they thought the worst had happened. Sadie’s mother almost took her own life but Sadie was able to unlock the chest where she had hid just in time to prevent that tragedy.

Sadie’s parents knew they had to try and escape from the ghetto. With the help of Pawel, a sewer worker, they devised a risky but clever plan. Sadie’s father had dug a hole under their toilet so they could escape the ghetto through the sewer system under the city that would ultimately take them out of Poland. However, as they were making their way through the sewer tunnels, two things happened. First, Sadie’s beloved father fell to his death. He was trying to help Sadie catch her balance. He lost his balance as a result and was swept away in the churning sewer waters. The other thing that happened was that Pawel told them that it was not safe any longer to escape from the sewer to the river that would take them out of Poland. To remain safe, they had to remain in the alcove in the sewer that had become their home. Sadie and her mother shared the space with the Rosenberg family, a very religious family that was comprised of the father, a son and elderly grandmother. To complicate things even more, Sadie’s mother was pregnant. The pungent smells of the sewer and the lack of light were something the two families never got used to but endured. Both families depended upon Pawel to bring them food and supplies and they tried their hardest to make the best of their situation.

It was hard for Sadie to always stay close to her mother and remain in their alcove. She began to explore the tunnels of the sewer. One day she found herself in front of one of the grates of the sewer. As she looked up to see the sunlight and the sky, Sadie saw a girl about her own age peering down at her. The girl’s name was Ella Stepanek. She was a young, Christian, Polish girl who had traveled to that side of town to find and buy cherries for her stepmother,Ana Lucia, even though they were out of season and going to be hard to find.. Ella soon discovered that Sadie was in hiding and she also realized immediately that she would do anything she could to help Sadie. Ella had lost her father in the war and her mother had died years ago. She was living with her stepmother now. Ella had difficulty tolerating the selfish and mean ways of her stepmother. For one thing, her stepmother was a Nazi sympathizer and she was constantly entertaining important Nazi officers at her father’s home. Ella suspected that her stepmother was probably sleeping with one of them as well. Her Stepmother was a despicable, self-centered person. She belittled and ridiculed Ella constantly. Ella’s only sibling, her brother, was living in Paris. Ella and Sadie became good friends as their visits continued over the ensuing months. Sadie regarded Ella’s visits as the highlight of her days. As Sadie’s and Ella’s friendship blossomed and grew, the dangers they both encountered grew in magnitude. Would Ella be able to keep Sadie safe from the Nazis and help save her?

The Woman with the Blue Star by Pam Jenoff was inspired by real life events. During the Holocaust, there were some families that hid in the sewers of Krakow to escape the brutality of the Nazis. It was hard to imagine how these families survived and lived under those conditions. The will to live and avoid the horrific ways of the Nazis, I imagine, gave them the courage and determination. I have long been a fan of Pam Jenoff and have read many of her prior books but this one was one of my favorites. This book explored the themes of friendship across social classes, hope, religion, trust, family, love, resilience, survival and loss. The Woman with the Blue Star was heartfelt, harrowing and suspenseful. It was a historical fiction book about World War II and the Holocaust but so much more as well. I loved the ending. Pam Jenoff’s writing and research was brilliant. This book will stay with me for a long time. I highly recommend this book.

Thank you to Park Row Paperbook for allowing me to read this advanced copy of The Woman with the Blue Star by Pam Jenoff through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

This book was very compelling. I really felt that I could understand how hard it was to be stuck in the sewers with no safe means of escape. It was a powerful, well-written read. (4.5 stars)

Title: The Woman with the Blue Star
Author: Pam Jenoff
Genre: Historical Fiction
Rating: 4 out of 5

1942. Sadie Gault is eighteen and living with her parents in the Kraków Ghetto during World War II. When the Nazis liquidate the ghetto, Sadie and her pregnant mother are forced to seek refuge in the perilous tunnels beneath the city. One day Sadie looks up through a grate and sees a girl about her own age buying flowers.

Ella Stepanek is an affluent Polish girl living a life of relative ease with her stepmother, who has developed close alliances with the occupying Germans. While on an errand in the market, she catches a glimpse of something moving beneath a grate in the street. Upon closer inspection, she realizes it’s a girl hiding.

Ella begins to aid Sadie and the two become close, but as the dangers of the war worsen, their lives are set on a collision course that will test them in the face of overwhelming odds. Inspired by incredible true stories, The Woman with the Blue Star is an unforgettable testament to the power of friendship and the extraordinary strength of the human will to survive.

This is not a happy book. I liked the characters; their strength, determination, and resourcefulness. I cannot even imagine hiding in a sewer for months on end. I did find the idea that Ella could stand in the middle of a street over a sewer grate for long enough to have entire conversations and give Sadie food and no one noticed a bit far-fetched. That wasn’t believable to me, but apart from that, I found the book entirely readable, even if sad.

Pam Jenoff is a bestselling author. The Woman with the Blue Star is her newest novel.

(Galley courtesy of Harlequin/Park Row in exchange for an honest review.)

(Blog link live 5/10.)

Based as it is on actual situations of the Second World War, the reader can’t help but be gripped by the building tension and horror young Sadie experiences as her Jewish family is driven from the Krakow ghetto to refuge in the sewers of the city. Contrast that with the privileged life of Ellie Stepanak, a Christian Pole who happens to catch a glimpse of Ellie behind the grate of the sewer. How the lives of these two girls intersect is a powerful tale of empathy and danger. The concern each demonstrates for the other is a vivid contrast to the cruelty of the Nazi overlords and sadly, even the culture of Polish society in place before the Nazis came to power.
Told in alternating chapters from the perspective of the two girls, we meet a cast of supporting characters who add to the complexity of the story — Sadie’s loving parents, a new born infant whose cries can bring danger to the group , Ellie’s stepmother who collaborates with the Nazis and wants nothing more than to have her stepdaughter gone. Danger lurks in every direction.
Meanwhile the Allies are getting closer and there is the hope that provides, but the added danger that comes from joining the resistance. This is a morally complex story made more gripping by its connection to history.
My one criticism comes with the end of the story which I will not spoil. Let me just say I had to reread the final chapters several times to understand what was happening.. This was the author’s intent, I am sure, but I still think it could have been written more clearly so the pieces fall into place more convincingly.
All in all a good read, but let me warn you, it does begin to get claustrophobic within the dark dank tunnels of the Krakow sewer.

The Woman with the Blue Star
by Pam Jenoff
Back of the Book: “"This emotional novel is filled with twists, turns, and displays of bravery and love that you will never forget, culminating in an ending that manages to be both surprising and uplifting." —Lisa Scottoline, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Eternal
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Lost Girls of Paris comes a riveting tale of courage and unlikely friendship during World War II.
1942. Sadie Gault is eighteen and living with her parents in the Kraków Ghetto during World War II. When the Nazis liquidate the ghetto, Sadie and her pregnant mother are forced to seek refuge in the perilous tunnels beneath the city. One day Sadie looks up through a grate and sees a girl about her own age buying flowers.
Ella Stepanek is an affluent Polish girl living a life of relative ease with her stepmother, who has developed close alliances with the occupying Germans. While on an errand in the market, she catches a glimpse of something moving beneath a grate in the street. Upon closer inspection, she realizes it’s a girl hiding.
Ella begins to aid Sadie and the two become close, but as the dangers of the war worsen, their lives are set on a collision course that will test them in the face of overwhelming odds. Inspired by incredible true stories, The Woman with the Blue Star is an unforgettable testament to the power of friendship and the extraordinary strength of the human will to survive.”
Impressions: Wow! This was a stunning book! Really truly!
Rated: It’s about WW2 so there’s a lot of ugly…
Liked: First off, I loved this book. It was emotional, engaging, and suspenseful. I don’t mean to make light of the topic of this book by writing about my enjoyment of it, however. The story was thought-provoking and what had happened during WW2 is beyond sad. At the end of this book, the author notes in her acknowledgments how this year’s isolation was challenging; I too have felt the heaviness of this year. I am surprised and thankful at how resilient my family, specifically my kids, have been. I truly can’t imagine the strength and courage it would take to watch the world around me slip away as it did for the Jews and others the Nazis endeavored to destroy. To be brave enough to keep fighting when all seemed hopeless… I’ve struggled this year with being motivated as I’ve been stuck home and having to homeschool our boys. This quote, “‘Find the things that give you hope and cling to them,’” made me stop and think how fortunate that I am to have hope, however. I don’t have to seek hope in myself or in this world but I have a God who is already victorious. Without this hope, I don’t know how others cope with life? What peace I have because of that hope; even when things in this world seem bleak.
Disliked: I was frustrated by the author's depiction of Saul’s faith. As a devoted Jew, I don’t think he would disregard his faith and its importance when it came to marriage. This exchange about marriage to a non-believer was frustrating,” ‘But how can we possibly? I blurted out. ‘I’m not religious.’ ‘Does that matter here?’ He smiled.”
I received this book via NetGalley in exchange for my honest review shared here.

I was provided an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I enjoyed the alternating perspectives of Sadie and Ella. They both had very different experiences during the German invasion of Kraków. Sadie's family is Jewish and is of course treated terribly by the Nazi's. Her family went from living a decent life, to being forced to move into the Jewish Ghetto where her parents were employed as hard laborers until they went into hiding in the sewers. Meanwhile, Ella comes from a wealthy family and her stepmother decides to befriend and entertain the Germans. Ella wants nothing to do with them, and when she notices Sadie at the sewer grate one day, she decides she will help her as a small act of rebellion.

I haven't read Jenoff's previous books, though I do plan to. This has more of a YA feel to it, as both Sadie and Ella are both a bit immature and impulsive given the gravity and impending doom of their situation. It was hard to believe given some of the actions that they took that they weren't discovered earlier. Then again, teenagers are impulsive and often act without fear of consequences. It is hard to say what anyone would really do given the life and death circumstances people actually were forced to deal with during WWII. I do appreciate that this is inspired by real people that survived the Nazi occupation of Poland in the sewers and those who helped them.

Overall this is a good book and I liked it. I liked that it was told from different perspectives and that it was set somewhere different.

It has been awhile since I have read a novel set during WWll. For a very long time that is all I had been reading. During the pandemic I switched to reading a lot of mysteries to help keep my attention. While I somewhat enjoyed The Woman With the Blue Star by Pam Jenoff, there was something lacking for me. The story is set in Poland during the German invasion. Sadie a young Jewish girl escapes with her family to the underground sewers. While there she develops a friendship with a polish girl named Ella who despises the Nazis. While I did know that some of the Jewish people in Poland escaped and hid in the sewers I had not read a story about it. Jenoff did an excellent job describing the conditions in the sewers, making it seem impossible that anyone could survive. Other than the setting I do not feel that I really learned anything new. When I read stories about the Holocaust I like to learn something and that did not happen for me in this book.

While I love Pam Jenoff’s writing style I did not love this book. I must state that I always feel guilty not giving a book about the Holocaust 5 stars because I commend authors for continuing to write on this subject, it is a time in our history that must never be forgotten. The Woman With The Blue Star is a book about true friendships that can develop in a very short time between people on the opposite side of war, it is about love, it is about resilience and most important it is about humanity and shows that there are always good people in a world that seems to have gone completely bad. Thank you NetGalley and Harlequin for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. The book was published yesterday May 4th I recommend giving it a try.

This story of World War II Krakow features two Jewish families who seek refuge in the seers under the city when the ghetto is raided by the Nazis. The pacing is perfect, keeping readers intrigued, and the surprise ending is perfect!

I find myself drawn to historical fiction covering the WWII time period. For some reason that time and what people had to endure fascinates me. The Woman with the Blue Star took me in a bit of a different direction from the usual stories I've read, covering two young women living out their lives in the same area, but in very different ways.

Sadie escapes the Nazis and has to take to the sewers with her family. I can't even imagine. Ella is living a cushy life among the German, but is it really all that good?

The Woman with the Blue Star is an insightful story, showing the reader what life was like at that time. It's also an emotional, heartbreaking but heartwarming, story. As with Pam Jenoff's other books, this one will stay with me for a long time and make me think about the hardships that the people had to endure. It was an extremely tough time period, but her words personalize the people and their stories for me and make them memorable.

I loved The Woman with the Blue Star and highly recommend it for all fans of historical fiction. I know you'll love it as much as I did!

I've read a few books set during WWII over the past few months, and most have been emotional, to say the least. The Woman With the Blue Star is no different in that aspect, but there was just something about this story and these characters that set it apart. The whole thing is wonderfully written and hard to put down. The hardships and horrors these people faced every day was only rivaled by their sheer determination to survive - even if they had to do that one day at a time while living in the sewers to avoid the concentration camps. Sadie and Ella show us that our station in life doesn't always dictate who we are and who we can or should be friends with. This book is emotional and thoroughly compelling from start to finish. It's one that touched me to the core and one that I won't soon forget.

When the Nazi's begin rounding up Jews living in the ghetto, Sadie and her family escape into the sewers. Her father is tragically swept away and drowns, but Sadie, her pregnant mother, and another family find a hiding place. One day when looking through a grate, Sadie meets Ella, a free Polish girl. Ella, who lives with her stepmother, quickly befriends Sadie and begins bringing her food.

Although this was a very interesting setting, I did not feel like I ever fully knew the characters. The characters seemed a bit stereotypical and lacked depth. The plot was slow paced and it seemed to take a long time to build momentum. Overall, 3 out of 5 stars.