Escape from Paris

For your historical fictions fans. The year is 1940 and England braces for invasion and the German army overruns Europe. Two American sisters in Paris risk their lives to save a downed British airman from Nazi arrest but Linda Rossiter and Eleanor Masson soon realize there may be a high price to pay for their heroism.

Discussion Guide Available

Escape from Paris
A Random House Library Book Club Pick

Pages: 315
Price ( Trade paper ): $13.95
Publication Date: June 2013
ISBN ( Hardcover ): 978-1616147938
Publisher: Seventh Street Books

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Romantic suspense amid the chaos of a world at war. The year is 1940. As England braces for invasion and the German army overruns Europe, two American sisters in Paris risk their lives to save a downed British airman from Nazi arrest. Linda Rossiter and Eleanor Masson soon realize the price they may pay when they read this ominous public notice: "All persons harbouring English soldiers must deliver same to the nearest Kommandantur not later than 20 October 1940. Those persons who continue to harbour Englishmen after this date without having notified the authorities will be shot." On Christmas Eve, the Gestapo sets a trap, and death is only a step behind the two American women.

"If you watched The Bletchley Circle, try this." - The Poisoned Pen


Carolyn Hart on Escape From Paris - interview by Don Lafferty

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Reviews of Escape From Paris

ESCAPE FROM PARIS by Carolyn Hart
Reviewed by Kristin Elise for Murder Lab
In addition to a collection of well-rounded characters, Hart reveals a Paris that sharply contrasts with the romantic City of Lights. The Paris of 1940 is a chilling landscape of ubiquitous swastikas and goose-stepping soldiers. Her citizens are poverty-stricken, oppressed and terrified. As Hart weaves the tale of the American sisters, she effectively incorporates very specific historical examples to bring this frightning alternate city to life. Read the full review


ESCAPE FROM PARIS by Carolyn Hart
Reviewed by ForeWord Reviews, Fall 2013
“Hart has a way of immersing readers seamlessly into each moment of action so that their hearts will be pounding full force by the end of this story of heroism, sacrifice, and unexpected bravery… There are no words wasted in this gripping tale; it is a page-turner from beginning to end.” - Read the full review


ESCAPE FROM PARIS by Carolyn Hart
Reviewed by Karl Wolff for Chicago Center for Literature and Photography
I enjoyed reading Escape From Paris, because it was reassuring to see a traditional suspense novel done well. This might sound like I'm damning the novel with faint praise. I'm not. I give the novel high marks because it was well written, tightly plotted, and populated with believable characters. It makes splendid summer reading. There are spectacular dog fights, a harrowing prison scene, and ferocious verbal confrontations. The only drawback relate to the confines of the genre. Hart writes "cozy mysteries" and these aren't for everyone. Read the full review


ESCAPE FROM PARIS by Carolyn Hart
Reviewed by Martha A Cheves for A Book and A Dish
Carolyn Hart makes you see the brutal punishments, torture, and deaths of those who even spoke against them. She takes you into the torture rooms and gives you enough of a description that you knew what had to have gone on there. She takes you to the prisons where the women are held and exposes you to their treatment or should I say lack of it. You become so engrossed with the characters that you feel as if you actually know them on a 1st name basis. And she scares the heck out of you as you follow them through their lives as underground links. I had a very hard time putting this book down. I wanted it to end so the torture would end but I didn’t want to stop reading. This is a wonderful book of history. Read the full review


ESCAPE FROM PARIS by Carolyn Hart
Excerpt from a reviewed by Donis Casey, author of the Alafair Tucker mysteries

The extraordinary thing about this novel is that Linda and her compatriots are not in the least extraordinary. They are cold, hungry, uncertain, and scared for themselves and for their families. They are doing the best they can in an unbelievably difficult and dangerous situation. As Linda and her sister and young nephew become part of the escape line, a stop in the route that smuggles British soldiers over the line into unoccupied France and across the border into Spain, the tension becomes palpable. The odds go even higher when Linda falls in love with a wounded pilot who is forced to recuperate in the safe house until he is fit to travel. When he finally goes, Linda and Eleanor will not know if he made it, not for months, maybe never.

Linda’s world was so sharply drawn and realistic that I did not know if she or Eleanor or Robert or any of the heroic underground figures would make it. And some of them did not.

I’ll tell you one thing, this book made me wonder how brave I would be under the same circumstance.

ESCAPE FROM PARIS by Carolyn Hart
Reviewed by Lesa's Book Critiques "If you read Carolyn Hart's suspense novel, Escape from Paris, sometime in the past, you never really read it as she meant it to be read. The original publication was cut from 95,000 words to 55,000. Now, this work of her heart has been republished as it was written. It's a fascinating story of courage in World War II, the courage of people willing to risk their lives to save others."
Read the full review

ESCAPE FROM PARIS by Carolyn Hart
Reviewed by Chloe Winston, for Redding.com
"It takes a talented writer to express what Hart does so eloquently. It's spare writing, not "gussied-up" with lots of adjectives and adverbs. A reader is "with" the characters. One almost becomes a character in the story." -- Read the full review



ESCAPE FROM PARIS by Carolyn Hart
Reviewed by PEGGY BARNETT, for The News-Reporter
Carolyn Hart has written many mysteries and won many literary prizes. Escape from Paris, however, is from her early career when she wrote suspense novels. She has stated that she was a child during World War II, and that the war dominated their lives.

This story, set in 1940, is a favorite of hers. When it was first published, in 1982, she had to cut 38,000 words. Now it has been published in the original version.

The novel opens with vignettes of people in Coventry, England, (“And nothing will ever happen in Coventry,”) Germany, where Jews are being loaded on boxcars, and Pearl Harbor, where two young American sailors are planning to “re-up” because Pearl’s an easy berth.

The plot begins with two sisters, Linda and Eleanor, Americans living in German-occupied France. Eleanor has been taking Red Cross packages to wounded soldiers in a military hospital. Linda takes her turn one day and the suspense begins. An English soldier asks her to help him escape before he is sent to a prisoner-of-war camp. Eleanor has refused to leave until she gets word from her French husband, who has been missing since Dunkirk. (If you have forgotten some of the details, this book will remind you about the early days of the war.) Linda agrees to help Michael, and realizes belatedly that she’ll have to take him to their apartment.

The German soldiers, though usually friendly to Americans in the early days of the war, are a constant threat. Posters indicate that anyone found harboring English flyers will be subject to arrest. Danger is everpresent from the Gestapo, but a special villain is Major Erich Krause. He is loyal to the German army but is especially vigilant because his superior officers want those “enemies” found.

As Eleanor and Linda search for help, in increasing danger, minor characters, good and bad, add layers of interest. A neighbor is planning to turn them in, in order to save herself; a friend lends them money, but may be in trouble from her servants. Eleanor despairs of her husband’s survival and worries about her young son, still in school but resourceful and helpful.

A good romantic suspense novel has to have romance. So in the midst of their gathering and sending the English to safety, one wounded man, Jonathan, must be nursed back to health by none other than Linda. A kind French doctor is endangering her own life by caring for those in danger, including Jonathan.

Eleanor finds a priest who is part of an escape system, and over 50 men are sent on to possible freedom from the sisters’ apartment. The question is whether Jonathan will be well enough to join them, and then the system is probably compromised when two members of the chain are arrested.

The narrative moves between Linda and Major Krause, as he seems to be closing in on the apartment. The priest advises them to be ready to leave. Linda reluctantly applies for permission to go back to the United States, and that act alerts her enemies.




ESCAPE FROM PARIS by Carolyn Hart
Reviewed by Jill Vassilakos-Long, Co-author of Murder in Retrospect: A Selective Guide to Historical Mystery Fiction (with Michael Burgess), and Strange Cases: A Selective Guide to Speculative Mystery Fiction (with Paul Vassilakos-Long)

The book begins with a series of vignettes: 1940 from different perspectives. The English, whether they are in England or in the colonies, cling to the belief that Germany will not attack. Many refer to the threat of invasion as the “phony war.” In the United States, the president pores over a map of the Pacific theater and wonders where the Japanese are likely to strike. At Pearl Harbor sailors enjoy shore leave. In occupied France the Germans take control. The Nazis implement the “Final Solution” in Germany, and begin to tighten their grip in France.

By the last of these scenes, the reader is there, grounded in the time, but with the awful knowledge of what the immediate future holds. Then the main story launches, as Linda Rossiter visits a hospital in place of her sister, and becomes enmeshed in an effort to help a British soldier escape.

As the book follows the efforts of the sisters, Linda and Eleanor, the reader sees the occupation of France from a personal level: the lack of food, the tacit resistance of the people, the privations and fears that turn some of those people into collaborators… the every day petty irritations, side by side with monstrous, world-shattering horrors.

The author is Carolyn Hart, so the writing is excellent and the book is a quick read, but at the same time it is vivid and memorable. The reader comes to understand the stunned disbelief of people witnessing the inhumanity of the war, and will share the characters’ astonished horror at the brutality of the occupying troops, knowing that the crimes witnessed by the characters were common in real life at that time. It is easy to rejoice when the book’s characters withstand terror and torture, refusing to turn in their countrymen, at the same time already grieving for the likely outcome when they are overcome, or simply used as a tool in the Gestapo’s campaign to terrorize and control the local people. The reader will be furious when petty greed is the motivation for betrayal, at the same time knowing that many collaborators were moved as much by greed as by fear. Even though this is a work of fiction, the fact that the scenes depicted could be taken from memoirs and newspapers from the time of the Nazi occupation, makes this book a window into the heart of occupied France in 1941.

This book is recommended for anyone from high-school age through adult who is interested in experiencing a first person novelization set in occupied France.



From Ed Gorman's Blog
ESCAPE FROM PARIS by Carolyn Hart
"ESCAPE FROM PARIS is the story of a year of war, the year France fell to the Germans and England awaited invasion. It is the story of people around the world, touched by war. It is also the story of two American sisters (Linda and Eleanor) in Paris who help British fliers from Occupied France. The Gestapo has decreed death for all involved in saving RTF fliers."

I wasn't sure what to expect when I started reading Escape but within four pages I was hooked. The book begins cleverly and powerfully with short sharp chapters focusing on various people in various places caught up in the war. Readers get a vital sense of a WORLD war right at the start.

Though the novel is rich with historical touches and insights the story is relentlessly told with numerous scenes of suspense perfectly set up and executed. From the psychotic German obsession with destroying Jews to the turncoat cooperation of the Vichy government to the underground movements (such as the one the sisters participate in) Escape is a non-stop thriller that a wide range of readers will not only enjoy but also remember.