A Bounty of Books

A Fifty Year Silence, by Miranda Richmond Mouillot, is the story of a granddaughter's search for the reason behind the breakup of her grandparent's relationship. As a child, there was such a separation between her grandparents, that it wasn't until she was twelve years old that the thought that her grandparents once knew one another, much less had once been married, crossed her mind. No one knew what happened between them, and her grandparents hadn't spoken in over fifty years. The feelings between them were so strong, that her grandfather wouldn't set foot on the same continent as her grandmother.

Mouillot grew up extremely close to her grandmother, and couldn't fathom never knowing about this huge part of her life. Her natural inclination toward history led her to figure out what happened. Mouillot moved to France after college to live in a house her grandparents bought together in a small village in France. She thought this would help her search for the truth. Using nothing more than her grandparent's official refugee documents from WWII and the few memories she could get her grandparents to part with, she pieced together the story neither one of them could, or would, remember.

Mouillot is an engaging writer. She easily draws the reader into the mystery surrounding her family history. Weaving together the past and her present search for her, Mouillot makes the reader feel as if he/she is a fly on the wall as she searches. I felt her frustration as she hit dead end after dead end. As she finally the realized the truth, I felt some of the wallop that she must have felt as she realized her family's history and happiness was simply another causality of war.

I recommend A Fifty Year Silence to any person interested in family history, the effect of WWII on European Jews who managed to stay out of concentration camps, or anyone interested in how the past influences and informs the present.

Blogging for Books provided this book to me for free in exchange for an honest review. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255