The Alice Network by Kate Quinn - VBC Nov 2018

[Lenore]

Since we seem to be in a post-turkey stupor, I thought I would throw out another question, slightly altered, from the Reading Group Questions at the back of the book. We can all agree, I think, that René's treatment of Eve was appalling, but as to his restaurant and the way he ran it,

René Bordelon is denigrated by his peers as a war profiteer and an informer. He sees himself as a practical businessman, pointing ou that he is not to blame for making money off the invaders . . . . [Is he] a villain or an opportunist?

Is an opportunist by definition morally tainted?

[Dayna]

Both—he sees a way to make a huge profit, which makes him an opportunist. He is a villain for the way he treats Eve.

[Dena]

Dayna wrote: "Both—he sees a way to make a huge profit, which makes him an opportunist. He is a villain for the way he treats Eve."
I think both because also he is a villain for kowtowing to the evil Germans. It seems to me he ought to have taken advantage of his situation & reported to the Resistance.

[Lenore]

Dena wrote: "...It seems to me he ought to have taken advantage of his situation & reported to the Resistance."

Just for fun, I think I'll play devil's advocate here. Wouldn't he be at enormous risk of being shut down and executed if the Germans realized that he was reporting to the Resistance? At least if he stays open he can provide jobs and food to some of the citizens. (And yes, the risk is not dissimilar to that he runs if his employees report to the Resistance, but he was trying to prevent that from happening.)

[Dayna]

Maybe he could report the information to an intelligence network, which would be more judicious about how the information was used. Like in WWII the Brits had the Enigma Machine but didn’t always use the intelliegence they got from intercepting messages.

[Sara]

I just finished the book, and had some similar reactions as many of the aforementioned comments have already addressed. I was frustrated that Charlie’s math skills weren’t used as more than a quirky-character-trait, and annoyed with most of her actions until closer to the last third of the book- it seems like she matured miraculously somehow. Maybe impending motherhood does that to one.
Eve’s story was fascinating. Stomach-turning at times, yet also incredibly courageous. The descriptions of her hands always made me cringe; but it was effective to understand her sacrifice at her work, and a bit about her character.
I also was a bit puzzled by Rene’s name staying the same first name....I would think he would want safety for himself first and foremost, and keeping the same first name seems risky to me, especially considering that he stayed in the restaurant business and named it the same thing, albeit in another location.
(And since it’s an LRK group, I found myself thinking that I couldn’t fathom Russell doing the things Eve does- too harsh? Too dark? Too....something? I can’t put my finger on it- during the war as a spy.)
The Afterword was almost more gruesome to read than anything in the novel; historical fiction is still fiction, and easier to put horrors into boxes of ‘it’s made-up stories.’ Much harder to read about what really happened, and the depths humanity can go to in war. These women were astounding.

[Erin]

Dena wrote: "I think both because also he is a villain for kowtowing to the evil Germans. It seems to me he ought to have taken advantage of his situation & reported to the Resistance."

That's a very altruistic stance, I think? Generally speaking, I don't know that I would be able to fault anyone for putting their own interests and security above the Resistance. Especially since the Germans weren't really "evil Germans" in WWI, they were just the opposite side of a conflict. And a conflict that had nothing to do with most of the people fighting in it.

I've always struggled with this because they always seem to be vilified in both WWI and WWII, but I found a good explanation of what was going on in WWI: https://www.thoughtco.com/causes-that...

[Erin]

Sara wrote: "Eve’s story was fascinating. Stomach-turning at times, yet also incredibly courageous. "

Totally agree. I honestly found Charlie and her story a bit too forced to care about. Like it's just a vessel to have a reason to learn more about Eve's story. I wonder what the book would have been like if we had just had Eve's story in regular chronological order, without Charlie and without the back and forth.

[Sara]

I agree. I wonder if the author thought Eve's story couldn't stand alone, or needed the extra drama to shine brighter?

[Lenore]

Erin wrote: "...Especially since the Germans weren't really "evil Germans" in WWI, they were just the opposite side of a conflict. And a conflict that had nothing to do with most of the people fighting in it."

I beg to disagree here. While it is absolutely true that Germany was drawn into the mess by its mutual defense treaty with the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Germans were brutal to civilians in Belgium and France. In fact, there is some thought that the U.S. might not have entered the war but for the anti-German feeling that arose because of atrocities committed on civilians. I highly recommend both Barbara Tuchman's The Guns of August and Christopher Clark's The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War in 1914, to both of which I recently listened.

[Lenore]

Sara wrote: "I agree. I wonder if the author thought Eve's story couldn't stand alone, or needed the extra drama to shine brighter?"

I agree, too. And if that was the author's reasoning, she was just wrong.

[Dena]

Lenore wrote: "Sara wrote: "I agree. I wonder if the author thought Eve's story couldn't stand alone, or needed the extra drama to shine brighter?"

I agree, too. And if that was the author's reasoning, she was j..."

Me "three." One of my first comments (or maybe in my review) I thought it would make more sense - perhaps because I listened rather that read- to have it all chronological. And as Sara brought up the idea of Eva's story by itself, I also wonder if I'd have preferred the book by leaving out the annoying Charlie.

[Erin]

Lenore wrote: "the Germans were brutal to civilians in Belgium and France."

Fair point, Lenore! Thanks for the non-fiction recs!

[Lenore]

As we are on the second to the last day of this book, and as discussion seems to have died down, I hope you will forgive me as I indulge in a rant I have wanted to post since day 1.

I wanted to like this book, I really did. I was a history major in college, I love both historical novels and espionage novels, I am especially interested in World War I (both for the haphazard way the world slid into the war -- with lessons for our time -- and for the dramatic effects on geopolitics it continues to have to this day), the book was well-reviewed, and people whose taste I respect liked it. This book checked all those boxes. But the more I read it, the more frustrated and annoyed I became, and I really disliked it in the end.

Let me grant that the absolute historical details, such as the exploits of the Alice Network and the horror of Oradour-sur-Glane, were apparently rendered with accuracy and real feeling. I was glad to learn about the Alice Network and the real-life heroism of Louise de Bettignies. But when one is writing fiction, one is world building, and so the characters and dialogue have to seem realistic and the small details of daily life have to accord with what we know to be true. I know I have been accused of being obsessed with details, but as Mies van der Rohe observed, "God is in the details," and that is certainly true in creating a believable fictional world. (And one reason why I like LRK's novels so much is that she is VERY good with the details.) And that is where this book totally failed me.

We have already discussed above that Charlie is not really a believable character: a math whiz who corrects major errors in her father's law office and earns her own money but allows her mother to pick all her clothes, incredibly self-centered and impulsive. And she's not really a likable character either, because of those characteristics. I've also discussed the unbelievability that anyone could be shocked by a single woman on a train in 1947 or that a trust fund created in the early part of the 20th century would vest at age 18, or that a banker would refuse to disburse money if that were the case. And I have already noted that all of the seduction scenes seemed incredibly stilted and unrealistic to me, and did nothing, in my view, to advance the plot.

But there's more, and these are just a few examples: Charlie, a pregnant woman, appears to spend the night in Eve's house without ever visiting the toilet. (She says in Chapter 3 that she had not dared to wander about the house.) Later, as they are tootling around France, Charlie begins to check into hotels as Mrs. McGowan -- but French hotels in the period following WWII and as late as 1988 (the last time I was in France -- it may still be the case) demand the identity card or passport of guests checking in, and Charlie's passport would have listed her real name. It's just a little too convenient that the pearls and the new car show up on the very morning that Charlie is going to meet her parents with Finn.

And the details about Major Cameron made my crazy as well. An apparently well-educated Englishman using "me" where he should use "I." (I caught that when I was listening, before I got a paper copy, so I don't have a citation to the page.) Where did Cameron, an Army major (not an enormously high-salaried position) and convicted felon get the money to set up the apparently generous secret "pension" fund for Eve? And (for some reason) most annoying to me is his reference (on page 228 of my edition) to Marguerite, Lili, and Violette as his "flowers," something a fluent French-speaker (which we established in Chapter 2 that Cameron is) would never say, because while Marguerite (daisy) and Violette (violet) are flowers, Lili, in French, is not a flower, but rather the diminutive of Elisabeth. The French word for a lily is muguet.

So, in sum, while I found the history of the spy network very interesting (and agree that it could have been much better by dropping Charlie's story completely out of it), I found the novel unbelievable and disappointing.

Thanks for indulging my rant.

[Erin]

Lenore wrote: "Thanks for indulging my rant. "

That was some rant, Lenore, LOL!

I think small details start to snowball when a book isn't doing it for you, you know? Like if the plot is super compelling or there is just something about the characters that I love, the little errors and details aren't as glaring and don't bother me as much. But when I'm kind of meh about plot/characters, I start to really see those errors/details.

[Dayna]

Lenore wrote: "As we are on the second to the last day of this book, and as discussion seems to have died down, I hope you will forgive me as I indulge in a rant I have wanted to post since day 1.

Lenore, I agree with most of the rant regarding the details. Some books require the willing suspension of disbelief to be enjoyed, and this was one. I *did* like the juxtaposition of Eve and Charlie’s stories being told separately and then coming together at some point. As a literary or story-telling device, I especially enjoy that. Some parallels are necessary in the separate stories, but the ones in this story are a bit contrived or forced and are therefore less believable. Like you, I appreciated the historical basis for the book, and that is one of the things that kept me reading to the end. No regrets on spending the time to read the book, however.