Selva comes from a high ranking family in Istanbul as well as being beautiful and smart. Her older sister has found a fast rising man who will go far in the government. It's expected that Selva will do something similar except she falls in love with Rafael Afandari, a Jewish son of a local pharmacist. Her father disowns her and so she and Rafi get married and run away to Paris. Unfortunately, this was just shortly before WWII and the Nazi invasion of France. Now Rafi is in constant danger as are all Jews in France and Selva has just been contacted by a friend of her sister's who now works in the Turkish consulate in Paris. Turik is working to get them back to Turkey and keep them safe as well as all the Turkish Jews he can find but it will not be easy and the danger is great.
Amazon gave this away during Book Day in 2018 and then it was chosen for my book club (I may have helped push that decision). I enjoyed Selva's story. The part with her sister was slow and didn't seem to add much to the story except to occasionally give some backstory to Selva. My biggest issue with the story was the train ride which for the most part had nothing happening until close to the end when it just seemed like the writer thought it had been too easy so let's throw a rape scene in. I get that those things happened but the way it was handled in the story just seemed too contrived. In all though, I did enjoy the book. Most of what I've read about WWII and the Holocaust have been centered in Germany, Poland, and surrounding territories. I had never heard Turkey mentioned in anything so it was interesting to see what they were having to deal with, both the government and some of the people.
Page count: 395p/2,860p ytd/313,765p lifetime
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