Cover Image: The French Baker's War

The French Baker's War

Pub Date:   |   Archive Date:

Member Reviews

If you want an excuse to angry cry and experience having your heart ripped out, this novel is the one. Mothers, take heed, this is not an easy read if you are an empath or have an overactive imagination.

Was this review helpful?

If you enjoy historical fiction, this is definitely the book for you! Set in 1940’s occupied France during the Second World War, The French Baker’s War closely follows a young family’s personal experience of upheaval, loss and despair during a terrible period in European history,

I found this book a difficult read, purely because Whatling unapologetically allows some of his characters to openly display anti-Semitic thoughts and feelings. While I personally found this quite upsetting to read, I think it’s really important that historical fiction writers remember to reflect this in their story telling to provide a believable and truthful account of how terrible these times truly were.

The novel is despairing in tone; it feels bleak and hopeless from the beginning which again successfully represents the truth of the era. This doesn’t negate from your enjoyment as a reader - on the contrary, I couldn’t help but read on to find out what had happened to Mireille!

Overall if you are looking for a historical novel that accurately portrays the atrocities the war caused, not just on whole countries but on the individual people within them, then you need to pick this up. I’ll definitely keep this book in my thoughts - poignance at its finest.

Was this review helpful?

3-1/2 stars

This is a WW2 story set in France, the story of a baker whose wife suddenly and mysteriously disappears, leaving her young boy alone, at the same time he finds a Jewish woman hiding in his shop. It was an interesting story that kept me reading, but the writing style was so understated and almost aloof to the feelings and inner workings of the characters, that I get apart from the story and never as involved as I like to get. This is a good story but just ok for me. It’s the first book I’ve read by this author. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for a free advance copy of the book in exchange for my honest opinion.

Was this review helpful?

Wow. This book was intense and sad. The theme throughout was love.... Andre's love for his wife and child, Emilie's love for her family, Frederic, and Andre. The love of the bakery. Dupont's love for his partner. If you take a step back, the big picture is there... especially after Andre's talk with the priest. It was nice to read a book about WW11 that showed the more realistic side of the war and what every day life was like then - the fear, the anger, the damage that was done emotionally and physically. No flowers and poems here... just the intensity of learning to survive any way possible. And while Andre was angry, I wouldn't call him abusive as another reviewer did. He is angry he cannot locate and/or save the love of his life. I only wish that some lose threads were tied up, but people come into your life when you need them most... and perhaps that is yet another lesson of war.

This is a definite must-read, especially for WW11 history fiction fans.

Thank you to NetGalley for the free copy of this book to facilitate my review. All opinions are my own.

Was this review helpful?

Thank You NetGalley, BooksGoSocial and Author for this amazing ebook copy for an honest review!

The French Baker's War by Michael Whatling was incredible!
This unique story, fast paced story and its beautiful writing was awesome to read.
The story is absolutely riveting in itself. I was sucked into a world and the characters were very alive here!
Which is ultimately what drew me in and kept me turning the pages.

In short, I loved this book and would highly recommend it to fans of historical fiction!

Thank you again for the amazing opportunity to read and review this outstanding book!
I'll post to my Bookstagram, Goodreads and Facebook accounts closer to pub date!

Was this review helpful?

Twists and Turns and a surprise ending

Andre owns a pastry shop in Nazi occupied France. He runs it with his wife Mireille and his young son Frederic. One day upon returning from purchasing baking supplies he finds his son standing in the street, his wife is missing and a very scared Jewish woman is hiding behind the display case.
As his wife stays missing, Andre tries to find out what happened to her and gets nowhere. He allows the Jewish woman to stay and care for his son, reluctantly as he wishes her to leave but she has nowhere to go and he has no one to care for Frederic.

Andre's life crumbles more and more and his life becomes one of nothing but trying to find his wife. This is the story of that search and of his home life with Frederic and the Jewish woman while he searches. It has a lot of twists and turns, and it ends in a surprising way.

If you like WWII and mysteries you will like this book. It is more about the human relationships and how they deal with the occupation and with Andre and his missing wife.

I thought it was interesting to hear about the French pastry shop and the small town. I wondered why the author only had the story from the point of view of Andre and the Jewish woman and not from Mireille as well. She came into the picture only at the end of the book. I would have liked to have more development of her character as to where she was and how she was dealing with being away from her family at the same time as Andre was dealing with her absence.

It was a good mystery, but I did feel it was missing part of the story.

Thanks to Michael Whatling, BooksGoSocial, and NetGalley for allowing me to read a complimentary copy in return for an honest review.

Was this review helpful?

Although I felt the story idea was fine, with points of view from both the male and female protagonists, the writing itself did not inspire me at all. It lacked the eloquence and warmth to inspire empathy with the characters. As well, the ending was brusque, anti-climactic and unsatisfactory.

Was this review helpful?

Firstly my thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for this advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

I’m not entirely sure how I feel about this novel, but possibly a bit numb given the very dramatic ending. Survival of German prison camps, only to bring about the downfall of innocent bystanders was doubtless a common-place story during the war. The novel is well written, with empathy and emotion. The characters played their roles in this realistic period of fear and dread, displaying their strengths and weaknesses with conscience eventually taking precedence. My congratulations to Michael Whatling on this extremely engaging historical novel.

Was this review helpful?

This book was a fast read for me. The story was good and I love reading about this time period. But honestly nothing really stood out for me. It didn’t pull the emotions that some books of this time period do for me. The writing was good too.

I voluntarily reviewed a copy of this book provided by NetGalley.

Was this review helpful?

Andre, Mireille and their four year old son Frederic live in an apartment above their patisserie shop in France and the Albert’s are a happy family. Due to the Second World War, it’s difficult to find baking supplies and Andre has to extend his search further. He returns one day to find his young son playing in the street, Mireille missing and a starving Jewish woman hiding behind the display case.

He has no idea what to do, Mireille's gone, she wouldn’t leave the shop empty, abandon him and Frederic! He desperately tries to find her, he asks the owners of all the other businesses in the street and everyone living nearby. Nothing, they didn’t see her leave, no one knows what happened to her and he’s distraught.

Andre’s a compassionate man, he helps Emilie, and she’s hurt, terrified, hungry and filthy. She stays at the apartment, it’s impossible to get her out of town without someone noticing and very dangerous. Andre reports Mireille missing to the police, he didn’t want to involve the Germans and he’s horrified when a German officer visits his shop. Is Nazi officer Egger interested in a French woman mysteriously going missing or is he really looking for a Jewish woman who has escaped?

The French Baker’s Wife plot is about Andre searching for Mireille and he will do whatever it takes to find her, he will never give up and he needs help from the French resistance. A story full of mystery, suspense, danger, intrigue, secrets, desperation, and a few shocks. Michael Whatling has written a very unique WW II historical fiction story, it’s dramatic, intense, engrossing and has a cast of interesting characters.
I received a copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review and four stars from me.

Was this review helpful?

Trigger warning: one of the main characters is emotionally abusive throughout most of the book.
I really wanted to like The French Bakers Wife by Michael Whatling. The premise sounded so promising. The long winded writing and a self absorbed main character just didn't deliver. It was definitely a unique take on an often written about subject. The son, Frederic, is a bright boy who appears to have autism. While none of the adults understand what he's struggling with, they seem to understand that he's brighter than he might appear, at first glance, and that he must be protected. The father, Andre', is dealing with a lot and takes it out on everyone around him, especially those who're trying to help. While Emilie shouldn't be there, the Nazis were the ones that forced her to come. I didn't love the ending but it's probably pretty realistic.

Was this review helpful?

A bakery in France in 1943. A hidden Jewish women and a women who has disappeared. German soldiers on the streets. A spellbinding story.

Was this review helpful?

This book took me on a grand emotional journey. From joy to sorrow to confusion and anger, and then back again through them each, <i>The French Baker's War</i> is a beautiful narrative. I smiled at Andre's kindness toward Emilie, cheered at his acts with the Resistance against the Nazis, and felt my eyes well up as I read what happened to Mireille. Stories of the world wars, World War II in particular, tend to focus on the battles and the actual warfare. <i>The French Baker's War</i> takes a different route, showing us the pain and cruelty war inflicts on civilians, on families, on communities; how it turns neighbor against neighbor and friend against friend, shattering towns like porcelain thrown against a stone wall, only for the pieces to be picked up and glued back together into a new shape, sharp edges and all. The hard truth of this book is that sometimes very good people do very good things, selfless, noble things, and in return are punished and committed to suffering. There are no easy decisions for these characters, no choices made without intense consideration.

The details in this book are vivid, including a paragraph or two describing the construction, assembly, and initial use of the main display case in the Albert's pastry shop. The characters, especially Andre, Emilie, Mireille, and Monsieur Durand, feel fleshed out and complex, as though they had narrated their versions of the events directly to Michael Whatling for his recording in this volume. The way Mireille always says to bake three petit fours so that they will have something sweet to eat, the way Andre manages this, even during the most difficult periods of the story, Madame Monchamp's haughtiness, Gilles's drunken impropriety, they all come together spectacularly to tell an emotional, heartrending story. This book could, and should, be turned into a movie (but an adaptation that is highly faithful to the source material, please!).

I absolutely recommend this book. I won't say it was the happiest or most uplifting book I've read, but it was certainly cathartic, and well-written. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to go buy some petit fours and mille feuille from the Pâtisserie Saint-Léry.

Was this review helpful?

The French Baker’s War is a wonderful book with an interesting plot that kept me reading. The characters don’t always do things that are likable, but these are complex people trying to muddle through the situations they find themselves in. Like the quote at the beginning of the book says, “The guilty one is not he who commits the sin, but the one who causes the darkness.” I grew to like them because of the hard decisions they had to make, often ones with no winner.

Was this review helpful?