There during World War II the Gestapo had commandeered one venerable mansion after another, turning some into offices and others into torture chambers. The title of this book about Occupied Europe refers to the Avenue Foch, the widest thoroughfare in Paris. I learned things that would never turn up in conventional history books, things that gave me the feeling that I was getting at least an inkling of what it was really like to live in Nazi-occupied territory while despising the Nazis and everything they stood for.Īvenue of Spies: A True Story of Terror, Espionage, and One American Family’s Heroic Resistance in Nazi-Occupied Europe by Alex Kershaw (2015) 314 pages ★★★★☆ Despite all the reading I’ve done about World War II - dozens, and perhaps more than a hundred books - I found Alex Kershaw‘s book about Occupied Europe and one extraordinary American family’s experience there to be at least as revealing as the best political or military histories. If it’s true that “God is in the details,” wouldn’t it stand to reason that history can best be understood through the stories of the individual people who experienced it? It often seems that way, doesn’t it? Certainly, the reality of life in times past is far easier to get our arms around when we read about the lived experience of individuals rather than the kings, generals, presidents, and other muckity-mucks who tend to dominate the history books.Īvenue of Spies is a case in point.
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