Audiobook Review: The Nightingale, by Kristin Hannah

The Nightingale

• By: Kristin Hannah
• Narrated by: Polly Stone
• Length: 17 hrs and 26 mins
• Release date: 02-03-15
• Publisher: Macmillan Audio
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 Recently my neighbor and I were discussing audio books.  She had just listened to The Nightingale, by Kristin Hannah and suggested I might like it.  When I got home I purchased my own copy from Audible.  I found myself riveted to this  amazing story of two courageous French sisters fighting WWII on their own turf. One for the resistance and one at home in her village while German soldiers were billeted in her home. What a compelling story showing that even though the men were off fighting in battle, there were battles waged at home fought by wives and family.  

 The storyline dictates suspense and since it is the narrator's job to be the voice of the author I was pleased that it was superbly done by Polly Stone.  To say an audio book is a page turner is not quite the same. However, listening to just one more half hour is what I found myself doing the past few nights.   I recommend this book with 5 stars overall for both the story and performance!   

...Publisher's Synopsis....

In love we find out who we want to be.
In war we find out who we are.

France 1939

In the quiet village of Carriveau, Vianne Mauriac says goodbye to her husband, Antoine, as he heads for the Front. She doesn't believe that the Nazis will invade France...but invade they do, in droves of marching soldiers, in caravans of trucks and tanks, in planes that fill the skies and drop bombs upon the innocent. When a German captain requisitions Vianne's home, she and her daughter must live with the enemy or lose everything. Without food or money or hope, as danger escalates all around them, she is forced to make one impossible choice after another to keep her family alive.

Vianne's sister, Isabelle, is a rebellious 18-year-old girl, searching for purpose with all the reckless passion of youth. While thousands of Parisians march into the unknown terrors of war, she meets Gäetan, a partisan who believes the French can fight the Nazis from within France, and she falls in love as only the young can...completely. But when he betrays her, Isabelle joins the Resistance and never looks back, risking her life time and again to save others.

With courage, grace and powerful insight, best-selling author Kristin Hannah captures the epic panorama of WWII and illuminates an intimate part of history seldom seen: the women's war. The Nightingale tells the stories of two sisters, separated by years and experience, by ideals, passion and circumstance, each embarking on her own dangerous path toward survival, love, and freedom in German-occupied, war-torn France - a heartbreakingly beautiful novel that celebrates the resilience of the human spirit and the durability of women. It is a novel for everyone, a novel for a lifetime.