My Book Choice

The book that I have decided to do my independent study on is Sarah's Key by Tatiana De Rosnay.The story is about a girl named Sarah who is ten years old. Her and her parents were arrested in the middle of the night by French police just because they were Jewish. Sarah was desperate to protect her little brother so she locks him in a bedroom cupboard and promises to come back to him as soon as they returned. Sarah's story intertwines with a girl named Julia who was doing research on the roundup sixty years later. Julia finds secrets that lead her to Sarah.

“This is a remarkable historical novel, a book which brings to light a disturbing and deliberately hidden aspect of French behavior towards Jews during World War II. Like Sophie's Choice, it's a book that impresses itself upon one's heart and soul forever.”
-Naomi Ragen, author of The Saturday Wife and The Covenant
I found this quote and it really brought my attention towards this book. The reason that I have chosen to read this novel is because I am very interested in what happened back in the 1940s while World War II was going on. I would love to learn more about the war and what the Jewish families had to go through during that time. Judging from many reviews- such as this one- this story will be the perfect way for me to find out more.

After reading the reviews about the book I decided to research on the author herself. Rosnay was born on September. 28th, 1961. She was born in Paris, France and she is of the French, English and Russian descent . By 1992 she had already written 12 books in French and three in English. She has also written two episodes of the television show Family Affairs. In 2006 Rosnay's most popular novel Sarah's Key was published. The book has sold almost two million copies in English and over three million copies in french. In January of 2010, a number of French magazines issued a ranking of the top ten French novelists. Rosnay was ranked eighth. In January 2011 she was ranked fifth of the top ten most read French authors.

Since I did not enjoy the book that I had read last year for my independent study, I made sure that this time I was going to love the book I read. After doing a lot of reach on this novel and the on the author Tatiana Di Rosnay, I finally came to the conclusion that this was the book for me. According to reviews Rosnay is said to have a lot of talent, and I hope to see it in this story.

Title: Sarah's Key

Author: Tatiana Di Rosnay

Date of publication: 2007

Number of pages: 316

I am going to try and read at least 10 pages per day.