Last Twilight in Paris

Jenoff (Code Name Sapphire) delivers an artful parallel narrative of an Englishwoman’s investigation into her friend’s death during WWII, when they both volunteered for the Red Cross in Germany, and a Jewish woman interned in Paris by the Nazis. In 1953, Louise Burns finds a necklace with a heart pendant in a secondhand shop in Henley-on-Thames, and recognizes it as the one acquired by her friend Franny in Germany shortly before she was fatally struck by a car. Louise has always suspected Franny’s death was somehow related to the necklace, and after tracing it back to Lévitan, a Paris department store, she travels to France, hoping to track down the necklace’s most recent owner. Jenoff alternates Louise’s sleuthing with the story of Helaine Weil, a young Jewish woman who defies her parents to marry a musician and winds up imprisoned at Lévitan after the Nazis convert the store to a work camp. As Louise learns of Lévitan’s dark history, she uncovers shocking details about the necklace and about Helaine, who gave Franny the necklace before being taken prisoner. Jenoff offers a piercing depiction of Jewish life in Paris under German occupation, and keeps the pages turning with an intriguing mystery. Fans of WWII fiction will be riveted. Agent: Susan Ginsburg, Writers House. (Feb.)