Ordinary and Extraordinary Heroes of World War II

by Beth Cronk, Litchfield head librarian

With the recent 75^th anniversary of D-Day, the world has had a chance to honor the Allied troops who invaded Normandy in 1944 in the largest combined land, air, and naval operation in history.  It was remarkable to hear about the veterans in their nineties who commemorated the anniversary by once again parachuting into France as they had as young men.  The anniversary gives us an opportunity to remember the troops who gave their lives – over 4000 Allied troops on D-Day alone – and to learn more about all who did their part to fight tyranny in World War II.

World War II at Sea: A Global History is a definitive naval history of the war.  Author Craig L. Symonds wrote a narrative history of the engagements, the people, and the strategies, beginning with the London Conference of 1930 and ending with the surrender in Tokyo Bay in 1945.  It includes accounts of U-boat attacks, Dunkirk, Pearl Harbor, Midway, and Normandy.  Symonds explains with historical details that naval operations were key to the outcome of the war. 

If you like your history as historical fiction, you may enjoy The Paris Spy by Susan Elia MacNeal.  One of the most recent in the Maggie Hope mystery series, this one finds American-born British spy Maggie working in occupied Paris.  Another agent was gathering research for the impending invasion of Normandy when she was captured, and Maggie needs to locate that information for England while working to discover a traitor and find her missing sister. 

For some inspirational true stories, look for the brand-new book Invisible Heroes of World War II: Extraordinary Wartime Stories of Ordinary People by Jerry Borrowman.  These are not the stories of the generals and world leaders.  These are soldiers, ordinary citizens working with the resistance, journalists, combat engineers, code breakers, and factory workers. 

A biography of one of those unknown heroes is very popular right now.  A Woman of No Importance: The Untold Story of the American Spy Who Helped Win World War II is a bestseller by Sonia Purnell.  Virginia Hall was a Baltimore socialite who loved studying languages and who lost her leg in a hunting accident.  She worked for the State Department in Europe and then joined Churchill’s spy organization SOE in occupied France.  While posing as a newspaper reporter, she was crucial to building the French resistance and building a network of spies. At one point, the Gestapo considered her the most dangerous of all Allied spies.  Reviewers say this biography is fast-paced and gripping.

Mistress of the Ritz by Melanie Benjamin is a novel based on the true story of another American woman who worked for the French Resistance.  Blanche Auzello was an American actress who married the French hotel manager who took over the Ritz in its glory days.  When the Nazis set up their headquarters in their Paris hotel in 1940, the Auzellos hosted them while secretly working against them.  In addition to the tension of that situation, the Auzellos’ marriage was in trouble throughout their years together.  Reviews say this novel is well-researched and written in a compelling way, with historical figures like Coco Chanel and Ernest Hemingway appearing as supporting characters.

When it comes to such a huge, worldwide conflict, there are endless stories to be told.  Look for the D-Day display at the Litchfield Library to find even more books about this pivotal time in history. 

Hygge at the Library

by Beth Cronk, Litchfield head librarian

As we wind up the month of January, some of us are starting to get tired of winter.  But if you subscribe to the Scandinavian idea of hygge, the key is to embrace winter instead of wishing it away.  Winter has its own beauty and blessings.

In that spirit, the library will be having two Hygge Saturdays in February.  On February 2 and February 16, the first and third Saturdays of the month, we’ll set up the library meeting room with board games, puzzles, coloring sheets, free books, crocheting supplies, and a hot chocolate bar.  Drop in for some low-key, cozy fun between 1 and 3 p.m. 

The Friends of the Library always has a cart of free books next to the lobby, except when it’s a book sale weekend.  If you want to find some free books to keep, or to just not have to return by a deadline, come in to browse those anytime.  These books are things that don’t sell on the book sale, but they’re still often popular when they’re on that cart -- plus that inventory turns over frequently, so you may see entirely different things by the time you visit again. A few of our patrons like to stock up from that cart in case they get snowed in and need more books to read.

If you’re looking for a book to check out to read on a winter day, of course we have many more of those.  Here are a few of our newest additions:

The Flimflam Affair is the latest Carpenter and Quincannon mystery from Bill Pronzini.  Sabina Carpenter and John Quincannon run a detective service in San Francisco at the turn of the last century.  In this installment, a medium and his assistant are swindling grieving people out of their money, and the detectives must find a way to reveal them as thieves.  Meanwhile, they’re solving a murder, a theft from a burglarproof safe, and a mystery involving a gang of counterfeiters that includes a man who’s supposed to be dead.

Pictures of Longing: Photography and the Norwegian-American Migration is a new release from University of Minnesota Press.  It was written by Sigrid Lien, a professor of art history and photography studies at the University of Bergen, Norway, and translated into English by Barbara Sjoholm.  In the 1800s and early 1900s, more than 750,000 Norwegians emigrated to America, a large percentage of Norway’s population.  The immigrants sent thousands of “America-photographs” home.  The author examines a selection of these photos and explains to the reader how to interpret them, telling stories about immigrants and photographers as she goes.  Not surprisingly, many of the photos in the book are from Minnesota and North Dakota.

The Litchfield Women’s Community Club has given the library a donation for large print books from time to time, either in memory or in honor of one of their members.  We have two new large print books from their recent donations:  Freedom’s Light by Colleen Coble and Night of Miracles by Elizabeth Berg.  

Freedom’s Light is an inspirational novel about a young widow who is tending a pair of lighthouses in Massachusetts during the Revolutionary War.  Night of Miracles is a small-town story about an older woman who is inspired to begin teaching baking classes and who looks out for people around her who need some help; it has a theme of coming together to harness the power of community. 

Come to one of our programs for some comfortable time of connecting with others (part of the definition of hygge), or check out some books to take to your own cozy home.  Either way, I hope the library helps you enjoy the rest of your winter.

Reading Takes You to Every Era

by Beth Cronk, Litchfield head librarian

With the kids this summer, we’ve been talking about how “Reading Takes You Everywhere,” our summer reading theme, and that includes other times in history.  It’s true for adults, too: getting wrapped up in a story can feel as though you’ve traveled through time.  A number of new historical fiction titles at the Litchfield Library can carry you to different eras.

Love and Other Consolation Prizes is a new-ish novel by Jamie Ford, the author of Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet.  A twelve-year-old half-Chinese boy named Ernest is a charity student at a boarding school when, to his surprise, he is raffled off at the 1909 World’s Fair.  The raffle winner is the madam of a high-class brothel, where he becomes the houseboy and befriends the madam’s daughter and the scullery maid.  Returning to another World’s Fair in 1962, he looks back on the path his life took.  Surprisingly, this novel is inspired by a true story.

The Hamilton craze has led to an interest in Alexander Hamilton’s wife, Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton.  She was a force in her own right, co-founding the first private orphanage in New York City, which exists to this day as a family services agency.  The new novel My Dear Hamilton: A Novel of Eliza Schuyler Hamilton was written by Stephanie Dray and Laura Kamoie, based on letters and other original documents.  This popular biographical novel allows the reader to dive into founding mother Eliza’s life and the early days of America, from the Revolutionary War and meeting Alexander to her many active years of widowhood, preserving his legacy and advocating for causes important to her. 

Set during the Civil War, A Hope Divided is the second book in Alyssa Cole’s Loyal League series.  This historical romance features a free African-American woman who is a scientist and a spy, quietly helping with coded letters about anti-Rebel uprisings, treating Union prisoners, and assisting people who are fleeing the South.  When the Confederate Home Guard takes over her home, she and an escaped prisoner of war hiding in her laboratory have to get away through the Underground Railroad.  Readers enjoy learning about little-known aspects of the Civil War included in Cole’s books.

Mysteries are often set in historical time periods.  Catherine Lloyd’s Death Comes to the School is set in 1820.  This is the fifth book in the Kurland St. Mary mystery series, set in an English village.  Major Sir Robert and his wife Lucy have settled into village life, but their three-year marriage is less comfortable, and Lucy is unhappy that she is not yet a mother.  Lucy and others receive anonymous letters accusing them of witchcraft, and then the local schoolteacher is murdered.  Lucy steps in as a substitute, hoping to solve the mystery.

The Whispering City: Barcelona 1952 by Sara Moliner was first published in Spain.  This historical thriller is set during the height of General Franco’s fascist government, in a city full of rumors and violence.  A wealthy socialite is found murdered, and a young journalist is given the privilege of accompanying the police inspector handling the investigation.  But the journalist soon realizes that the clues don’t add up, and she and her scholarly cousin find themselves in danger when they become too curious. 

Whether you enjoy reading romance, mysteries, thrillers, or even fantasy novels, you can find books set in different eras of history.  Historical fiction can help us learn more about the past and broaden our perspective on the human experience. 

Travel to a different time in a book

by Beth Cronk, Litchfield head librarian

Do you like to go back in time when you read a novel?  Or to learn your history through a good story?  My very favorite way to learn about history is through musicals like Hamilton and Les Misérables, but I enjoy reading historical fiction, too.  Of course, some authors base their historical fiction on factual events and people, while others create stories and characters that simply take place in a different time.  Any author of historical fiction writes it best when they’ve done their research and have a solid sense of the time period of their story, whether that’s ancient times or the 20^th century.  Our library has a huge range of historical fiction, including these novels that have recently been added to our collection.

The Dangerous Ladies Affair by Marcia Muller and Bill Pronzini is a historical mystery.  This is book five in the Carpenter and Quincannon series about a pair of fictional detectives.  The series is set in 1890s San Francisco, with echoes of the Sherlock Holmes stories which were written during that era. In this installment, Sabina and John need to stop an extortion scheme and solve a locked room murder.

Tracie Peterson has a new book out with co-author Kimberley Woodhouse: In the Shadow of Denali.  This Christian fiction novel launches a new series called The Heart of Alaska.  A young woman works as a cook in the new hotel near Mt. McKinley, while her father works as a wilderness guide.  A young man arrives to become an apprentice guide, but his real goal is to investigate his father’s death.  The two find romance as they work together to find answers on the frontier in the early 1900s. 

Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk tells the life story of an 85-year-old woman as she walks to a party in New York City in 1984.  Based on a real person with a different name, Lillian was the top woman in advertising in the 1930s.  As she meets people from all walks of life along her way, the quick-witted Lillian reflects on her exciting and difficult life and the ways that the city has changed from the Jazz Age to the ‘80s.  Book critics like this one.

W.E.B. Griffin’s newest novel, Curtain of Death, features the kidnapping of two Women’s Army Corps members in Munich in 1946.  One of them works for the Directorate of Central Intelligence, and she kills the Soviet agents who kidnap her, causing repercussions for her agency.  This series, Clandestine Operations, is co-written with William E. Butterworth, and it features the creation of the Central Intelligence Agency and the beginning of the Cold War.

Fans of Regency romance may enjoy Someone to Love by Mary Balogh.  The Earl of Riverdale has died, leaving his fortune to the daughter no one knew he had.  Anna grew up in an orphanage in Bath, knowing nothing of her family, and now she must learn to be a lady, while dealing with the resentments of her newfound relatives and the attentions of a duke. 

The One Man by Andrew Gross is a thriller about an attempt to free a man imprisoned in Auschwitz.  A physics professor has been taken there, and the Nazis have burned his papers, leaving him as one of only two people in the world with the knowledge contained in them.  A man with a desk job working in intelligence in Washington, D.C., is sent on the mission. 

Historical fiction can take the form of romance, mystery, fantasy, horror, Christian fiction, or even comics.  Talk to our staff and we will be glad to help you find a book set in a time period you enjoy.