Fans pick 100 books like Three Hours in Paris

I like happy endings. There, I’ve said it. I love books. I’ve written more than sixty to date, and I read all the time in every genre. I also love history, and World War II is a particular passion. It was an era rich with drama, horror, and heroism, with stories begging to be told. So many of those stories, real and fictional, end in heartbreak. But the great thing about being a writer is that I can take the characters I love through hell and back, then, in the end, have them come shining through. That’s what I want as a reader, too.

I was a foreign correspondent seven time zones from home when my father died of a sudden heart attack. My grief mixed with guilt for never having sat down with him to unravel his vague vignettes about life and loss in the Holocaust. I wondered, how did he survive when so many perished? How much depended on resilience, smarts, or dumb luck? As reporters do, I started digging. I uncovered a Nazi paper trial that tracked his life from home, through ghettos, slave labor, concentration camps, death marches, and more. The tattered documents revealed a man very different from the quiet, quintessential Type-B Dad I knew…or thought I knew. 

I’ve always loved stories that rearrange reality in some simple, allusive way, including movies like Groundhog Day or The Truman Show. They remind me of a quote about Italo Calvino that I first read when I was a teenager and have loved ever since: ‘He holds a mirror up to life, then writes about the mirror.’ I tend not to be attracted to stories that simply depict reality and even less so to stories that completely abandon reality for an invented fantasy world. All my favorite fictions take place somewhere in between, in the blending of the real and the impossible. 

I was raised in a family of seven girls—no boys—with a tough but loving mother. I’ve been around strong women all my life. As a teenager I got tired of reading about smart, capable heroines who, by the end of the story, are oppressed and defeated. I get it: women have been stomped on. And I appreciate authors in past centuries who acknowledge that fact. But now I want to see women win; it’s as simple as that. This is what I like to read about and what I like to write about. The battles are never easy, but hey, that’s half the fun.

I like happy endings. There, I’ve said it. I love books. I’ve written more than sixty to date, and I read all the time in every genre. I also love history, and World War II is a particular passion. It was an era rich with drama, horror, and heroism, with stories begging to be told. So many of those stories, real and fictional, end in heartbreak. But the great thing about being a writer is that I can take the characters I love through hell and back, then, in the end, have them come shining through. That’s what I want as a reader, too.

Growing up, my mother often shared stories of her evacuation to a small Wiltshire village during World War Two. Far from a warm welcome, the local children viewed the newcomers with suspicion, and they were made to feel unwanted. My mother did, however, form one lifelong friendship that was very important to her. Her tales inspired me to write a novel about an evacuee’s experience for my Creative Writing MA. Living in Dorset at the time, I set my story there. The research was fascinating, allowing me to weave together historical insights with my own memories and experiences of today’s rural life. 

Foreign cultures have always intrigued me. I am a Midwesterner who lived for several years in Latin America, teaching English and later doing field work in anthropology. As a young woman, I lived through a violent coup d’état in Chile, and I drew on that experience when I later wrote about political upheaval in Guatemala. A Ph.D. in anthropology gave me the opportunity to spend time in Guatemala and Mexico, some of it in Mayan towns. My love of historical fiction stems from my desire to enter and understand other worlds, and I am grateful to authors who spin their magic to bring far-off places and times to life. 

I write romantic historical fiction and am a lifelong lover of the works of Jane Austen. I am English, love historical novels but dislike books that give you “great lumps of facts” that slow up the storyline. I like stories and characters that capture your attention and your heart. Plots and backgrounds that make you think about what it might really have been like to live in those times.

I’ve always fallen in love with endearing characters. I want to go home with them. For me, the best characters are as real as any other friends. So many good books start with an idyllic situation. Say, a family or group of friends who have strong bonds. Then, someone is killed, or war breaks out. The idyll is smashed so the adventure can begin. I  also like the outsider perspective. The characters have to fight the powers that be. They must have a moral compass. Integrity. Why? I’m a Jewish woman. I was a Girl Scout in the Peace Corps, a poet, a social worker, and a therapist. 

Many years ago, when I was searching for a subject for my next novel, my editor at Doubleday asked me if I’d ever heard of Toto Koopman. A biography of her had recently been translated from French. It was a slight book, covering her whole life, from her beginnings in Java to her adventures as a spy for the Allies and the Italian Resistance. I was hooked and spent five years, on and off, researching and writing the story of her World War II experiences. She was an extraordinary person—poised, beautiful, and intrepid. I hope you enjoy getting to know her as much as I did.