Alain grew up fast and became strong and compassionate. He learned what hatred can do to people…
When Paris Was Dark: A Sliver of WWII History by Y.M. Masson

by Y.M. Masson

4.7 stars – 10 reviews

Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled

Here’s the set-up:

Based on true events of my life in Paris during the German occupation from 1940 to 1944; it is the story of a young French boy who struggles through the hardships of a war he and his school friends do not comprehend.

Alain’s story starts in 1940 when he is strafed (machine-gunned) by German Stukas (Light attack bombers) on the roads of the Loire valley while fleeing the enemy advance with his mother. He survives the repeated attacks, although hurt in the face, but not gravely, he has to go on walking, but is not able to eat the meager fare his mother could get her hands on.

Traumatized by this introduction to war, upon his return to his home in Paris, Alain receives little attention from his family. He gets support and help from his school friends, teachers and from people he befriends: a nun, a baker, a prostitute, and a friend of the family. Although not Jewish, he and his classmates are witness to the Nazi violence of the Holocaust when, one morning, Sarah and Isaac, the only children in his class wearing the dreaded yellow star, are brutally taken away from their classroom by German soldiers and French police officers. The twins were never heard of or seen again. The images of that day are etched forever in Alain’s and all his schoolmates’ minds.

The book shows the increasing food deprivation the Parisians are subjected to; it makes the reader share Alain’s fear stemming from the German edicts, curfews, street checkpoints, and round-ups. He tells of his fear, almost panic of being buried alive when he has to go down to the dank and dark basement during the night bombing raids.

Yet he and his friends never give up hope. They learn about the Allies landing in Normandy from the London broadcast late the night of D-Day. After the long days of the battle for the liberation of Paris, he goes out to welcome and thanks the American soldiers who freed him from the German oppression, and mainly from his daily fears.

Waiting for the day of victory over Germany, Alain continues to fight to get his health back, and to make sense of what war did to him and to his friends. Alain grew up fast and became strong and compassionate. He learned what hatred can do to people.