Book Review: A story of friendship, courage and three female secret agents

The Lost Girls of Paris by Pam Jenoff is a hard-hitting gritty narrative that tells the story of three women during World War II. It is set in war-torn London and France, and also in post-war New York.

As the harrowing weeks of WWII draw to a close, specially trained agents are sent into France to secretly aid in the war against Germany. They are men, but one radio operator Eleanor Trigg is confident women could be trained to do the same job, with equal effectiveness. Finally, she is given the go ahead and so trains women who display courage and the ability to think on their feet in the Special Operations Executive (SOE). She encounters an unyielding attitude from her male counterparts that women are incapable of this role, but the stoic and determined Eleanor persists as she trains her team to deal with privation and danger.

One of these operatives is French-speaking Marie Roux whom Eleanor recruits in 1943. Marie becomes the second narrator in the story as she leaves her small daughter for the mission to do the harsh training required. The French Resistance work with these women and like many of the male agents, they are sometimes captured and all trace of them is lost when they are taken by the terrifying Security Service of the Reichsführer (SS or the German Intelligence Unit). When finally posted to the field with her radio to communicate to London, Marie is challenged by the horror of the aftermath of war, yet still is determined to do her part. Marie, however, has the tendency to overthink and make rash judgements which can compromise the integrity of the mission.

Narrator number three is Grace Healey, a young American war widow, who whilst walking through Central Station in 1946 finds a suitcase under a bench. Overwhelmed with curiosity she opens it to find among personal belongings, a dozen photographs of young women with their names written on the back. And so begins Grace’s involvement as she seeks to find out who these women are, and what they have to do with the woman who was run over by a car outside the station that very morning.

To be honest, I didn’t find any of the characters endearing. Grace is obsessive to her own detriment; Eleanor is cold, brusque and seemingly devoid of compassion; Marie seems overly emotional and self-absorbed. It is these flaws in their characters, however, which make them more human and less heroic. Each woman displays incredible courage in the face of what appear to be insurmountable odds.

What I did love about The Lost Girls of Paris is how the ending of the book brings all of the threads together in a surprisingly logical way. Any story of loss and brutality endured during the war can cause the reader to recoil, but this is a story of determination, of overcoming misogyny, of fear of loss and also of finding solace in the understanding of your limitations.

The Lost Girls of Paris, by Pam Jenoff, is no rosy romance set under the Eiffel Tower, but a raw, frank and often confronting tale of how ordinary people do extraordinary things. This novel, based on real events, is available in printed and digital editions from the publisher, HQ Fiction.