Welcome to the Takeover Tour for A Picture of Hope by Liz Tolsma, hosted by JustRead Publicity Tours!

Overview

Full of intrigue, adventure, and romance, this new series celebrates the unsung heroes—the heroines of WWII.

Journalist Nellie Wilkerson has spent the bulk of the war in London, photographing pilots taking off and landing—and she’s bored. She jumps at the chance to go to France, where the Allied forces recently landed. She enlists Jean-Paul Breslau of the French underground to take her to the frontlines. On the journey, they come upon an orphanage where nuns shelter children with disabilities. Can they help save them before the Nazis come to liquidate it?

Review

Disclaimer: Although I received a copy of this book from the publisher, the opinions below are my own.

A naïve journalist gets in over her head when she embarks on an independent journey across France in the immediate aftermath of D-Day. She has neither guide nor contacts, but she thinks this random man she meets will help her. She’s dreaming of getting to glitzy Paris, but she’ll get a hard and fast look at life behind enemy lines instead.

Can you tell I wasn’t impressed with Nellie upon meeting her? She’s seen evil in her past as a southern belle, a past that is gradually revealed throughout A Picture of Hope, but it isn’t enough to prepare her for the Nazi atrocities she witnesses. By the way, this is not a novel for the squeamish. War is never pretty, and one of the events in the book is based upon the burning of Oradour-sur-Glane in June 1944. But Nellie does have a heart, and it shows in her treatment of the children she encounters and her determination to save them. That then becomes the story. There’s plenty of action as she and Jean-Paul race against time to get these children to safety. I thought the action-packed final chapters were the best, to be honest.

This is the second in a series of titles by different authors called the Heroines of WWII. And, sadly, my gripe with this novel is the same as with the first. The publisher has billed the series as celebrating “the unsung heroes – the heroines of WWII,” but the women in each novel never existed. Instead, they’re an amalgamation of real people. Each writer has taken the biographies of various women to create one main character. Which means, unless you read the authors’ notes at the back of each book, the real-life heroines remain “unsung.” Tolsma includes mentions of Marianne Cohn, but I had to look her up to learn who she was and how she gave her life for the safe passage of children. Her story didn’t have a happy ending, unlike that of our fictional Nellie, but it is important and deserves attention. This series is good for discovering the inspiring women who did so much. I just wish they were more front and center.

Rating

3/5

Product Information

Publisher:   Barbour Publishing

Publication Date:   01 October 2021

Book Information

Author Information

Liz Tolsma is the author of several WWII novels, romantic suspense novels, prairie romance novellas, and an Amish romance. She is a popular speaker and an editor and resides next to a Wisconsin farm field with her husband and their youngest daughter. Her son is a US Marine, and her oldest daughter is a college student. Liz enjoys reading, walking, working in her large perennial garden, kayaking, and camping.

Liz Tolsma’s Website   https://liztolsma.com/

Giveaway

Win a copy of A Picture of Hope and an Amazon gift card. Click on the graphic (left) or here.