Books set/about world war 2

[GinevraWeasley]

Looking for any good book recommendations set or about world war 2 or life during the 1930s/1940s.

Crooked Heart and Their Finest Hour and a Half by Lissa Evans are both very good - they're set in Britain during wartime. They're incredibly engaging reads, and very funny in parts.

Hitler's Canary by Sandi Topsvig..... about her grandfather & father in occupied Denmark & their roles in a little known story from WW2. The saving of 95% of the Danish Jews!!

Noel Barber's books are all set around the Second World War.
Penny Vincenzi's Spoils of Time trilogy - the middle book, Something Dangerous is mainly set during this period too.
The Other Side of Paradise by Margaret Mathew is a good account of the fall of Singapore and the POW camps.
Juliet Gardiner's Wartime Britain is a very good read about the Home Front.

Life after Life by Kate Atkinson is set in WW11

All The Light We Cannot See - set in France in WE2. It's a story about kindness really and the legngths we go to for the people we love. I can't remember the author but it is just a beautifully written book. My all time favourite.

All the Light We Cannot See is by Anthony Doerr

Oh yes, all the light we cannot see is beautiful, one of the best books I’ve read

I read ‘a treachery of spies’ by Manda Scott about the French resistance and ‘transcription’ by Kate Atkinson this summer. Both excellent

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society, The Girl Who Fell From The Sky.

In non fiction, many, but The Cut Out Girl by Bart Van Es and The Past Is Myself by Christabel Bielenberg

I'm almost finished the Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly which is very good.

Also The Nightingale

The Camomile Lawn by Mary Wesley has part of the story set during that time.

Im reading Everyone Brave is Forgiven by Chris Cleave. Its dark but comic, good so far.

I've been reading loads of WW2 stuff recently and one of the best was the 'The Siege' by Helen Dunmore. It is extremely easy to read / well-written but deals with horrifying subject matter - the Siege of Leningrad - and doesn't pull any punches about what people will do to survive

1930s rather than WW2 - All Among the Barley by Melissa Harrison. It's set in rural England, specifically a farming family, and is very evocative and moving.

Ted Allbeury wrote some excellent ones about SOE and the Resistance

I would also recommend Life after Life. I thought the chapters set during the Blitz were exceptionally good though I appreciate that the structure of the book was not popular with everyone

Balkan and Levant trilogies by Olivia Manning

I just read the first three books and am about to read the Levant series. I really enjoyed them in a quiet sort of way. They feel so personal and autobiographical.

Also
Night by Elie Wiesel
Atonement by Ian McEwan

I know the OP didn't ask about WW1 novels, but Pat Barker's Regeneration series is one of the best series I've ever read.

Atonement by Ian McEwan

"Das Boot - translation of a German novel about a U-boat"

I saw that on TV. It was brilliant.

I am currently reading Berlin: The Downfall by Antony Beevor. It is heavy going, but very interesting.

Fiction-wise I really enjoyed the Cazalet Chronicles which is a set of four books by Elizabeth Jane Howard set just before and during the war. If you want 1930s, Goodbye to Berlin by Christopher Isherwood is excellent. The film Cabaret is based on it.

The Reader by Bernhard Schlink is a phenomenal book set after, but about WWII.

I'm reading The Cut Out Girl by Bart Van Es, which has already been recommended here. Seconding that recommendation. I'm only half wsy but it is fascinating. The lengths to which some Dutch people went to help hide and protect Jewish people was amazing. And also staggering how others betrayed their neighbours and worked with the authorities.

Atonement by Ian MC Ewan

Captain Correlli’s mandolin (my favourite book of all times)

The secret keeper by Kate Morton (though only a part of it is about WWII)

War and Turpentine by Stefan Hertmans.
This one is about WWI but I still wanted to mention it because its SO good. The author writes about the memories of his grandfather as a soldier during the Great War, so beautifully and touching, this book really made me cry.

www.theguardian.com/books/2016/jul/02/war-and-turpentine-by-stefan-hertmans-review

Tamar by Mal Peet. About the Dutch Resistance. Fantastic book with a really shocking twist.

follow