Review: The House I loved, by Tatiana de Rosnay

This is the first preview book I've read that I truly didn't enjoy. I didn't care for de Rosnay's writing in Sarah's Key, and this was far less sophisticated. Rose has spent all of her married life in the home on rue Childebert, and though Napoleon’s Prefect now plans to tear the neighborhood down in the name of progress, she is unwilling to part with it. While she doggedly awaits the impending destruction she writes letters to her beloved late husband, sharing memories from their past, both good and bad, and building up to a final confession that she has kept as her secret for thirty years. Set in nineteenth century Paris during the Haussmann reconstructions of the Second Empire, this story is as much about that iconic city and its legacy as it is about the strength of its citizens. Those who enjoyed Sarah’s Key will recognize de Rosnay’s love for France and trend toward poignancy and tenacity in her characters, but this newest novel is more one dimensional than her earlier work. Told entirely through letters, the story tends to feel choppy and forced, and events are not related in chronological order, leaving the tale disrupted and at times hard to follow.

Book 49 on my way to 52.

Review: Sarah's Key, by Tatiana de Rosnay

I picked this one up because I received de Rosnay's newest novel as a review book from Book List and I figured I'd better brush up a bit on the author's previous work. In Sarah's Key, a woman in current Paris seeks information about the round-up of the Jews during the WWII occupation, specifically about a Jewish girl and her family who once lived in the same apartment. Throughout her search she is faced with the dark facts about the round-up while also dealing with problems in her own life.
I think book was warmly received, and it's hard to speak against it because of the subject matter—the roundup of Jews in Paris, France, is not a well known piece of history and deserves some highlighting, but I found this book tedious and depressing. Granted, the subject matter is depressing, but tackling it from the view point of a repressed woman in current times just added to the heaviness of the story. I see that parallels are being drawn between the time periods—repression then, repression now, and de Rosnay does a fine job of drawing the character of the French citizens, both now and then, but I expected something that felt uplifting, and never really found it. What I did find was florid and overly dramatic writing, and my attention waned about half way through.

Book 48 on my way to 53.