A stunning debut WWII novel from award-winning short story writer Michelle Wright, about the small but courageous acts a young woman performs against the growing anti-Jewish measures in Nazi-occupied Paris.
"Doing nothing is still a choice. A choice to stand aside and let it happen.”May 1940: After a devastating tragedy, Lucie and her mother Yvonne are forced to leave the only home Lucie has ever known in Australia and flee to France. There they seek help from the only family they have left, Lucie's uncle, Gerard.As the Second World War engulfs Europe, the two women find themselves trapped in German-occupied Paris, sharing a cramped apartment with the authoritarian Gerard and his extremist views. Unable to sit back and watch the horrific atrocities carried out by Nazi soldiers, Lucie uses her artistic talents to perform at first small acts of defiance against the occupying forces—illustrating pro-French independence pamphlets and forging identity cards.Faced with the escalating brutality of anti-Jewish measures, and the indifference of so many of her fellow Parisians, Lucie must make the difficult choice of how far she will go to protect her friends and defend the rights of others before she finds her own life on the line.