The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

Sometimes I have a good ol' Amazon blitz.  I look through all the reviews, pick out some books I quite fancy reading, and then I order them from the library.  Ordering books from the library is brilliant because there is no pressure.  If I hate a book after 20 pages then I can just throw it to the side and pick up another one, just as I did the other week as I'm sorry but I can not read a book about someone who makes a scrapbook about vintage teacups for her wedding because if I knew that person in real life, I'd throw fruit at them.  It was thanks to this Amazon and library method that I got my hands on The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.

The Lit & Pie Soc is written in epistolary form, hey look at me using a fancy word that basically just means the book is a collection of ficticious letters, and is set in the aftermath of the second world war.  It focuses on Juliet Ashton, a writer living in London, who receives a letter from one of the members of the eponymous Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society and so begins her fascination with the club.

Guernsey was actually invaded by the Germans during the second world war and so Juliet learns all about life under their rule, first from Dawsey Adams and then from other members of the group.  As she learns more Juliet becomes mesmerised with their story so that it takes up more of her thoughts than her real life does.

The Lit & Pie Soc is a nice book.  It moves along, things happen, there are a couple of twists, but, for me, it never really elevated itself to being a great book, despite the initial promise.  I certianly learnt a lot, and not in a lecture-y 'let me tell you everything I can about the war' way but in a very natural way.  I suppose my biggest concern was that the London lot were made to sound positively fantastic and frightfully clever darling and the gang on Guernsey, at times, came across as quite simple.

I felt like it had promise at the beginning, I like books that are letters and I used to love books about WWII so it had things going for it, but it didn't surprise me and was just a nice, standard, formulaic book with some of the characters morphing into each other.

If you're looking for something that's a bit different, that rocks the boat, that makes you think, then this isn't the book for you.  If you know what you like and you like a love story with a couple of twists but nothing too drastic then I'd suggest you should maybe think about getting this out of your local library.

One sentence back cover quote

OK, formulaic love story that lacks spark

Buy The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society from Waterstones