The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (2008)

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

From Ann to her blog readers,

Dear Friends,

I just finished reading Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows wonderful book and feel like I have new friends. The funny thing is that I have resisted this book for years because of what I considered a cutesy title. Nothing in the reviews I scanned encouraged me to pick it up.

But this fall some friends joined me in a book club and each member chooses what we will read in a particular month. A friend, who in the past has introduced me to some wonderful reads, chose this one. Well, I sighed and ordered the book from the library.

Can you imagine how astounded I was when I found out what a wonderful story was told through a series of letters about life on the island of Guernsey during and immediately after the German Occupation in World War II. I didn't even know where Guernsey was located before!

And then to find out that Mary Ann Shaffer died in February 2008, a few months before her first novel was published, made me sad. She worked as an editor, a librarian, and in bookshops. I am sure we would have been great friends just like her fictional character Julia felt that she and Elizabeth would have been friends . 

I loved the comfort this wonderful book allowed me to share during a difficult time. It's not great literature but I don't think it is trying to be something it isn't. It is perfect as it is.

I wish people still wrote letters. And I wish I knew people who could write ones like these.

Yours ever,
Ann

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