I absolutely loved the synopsis. There was too much focus on Vera and her husband and not enough focus on finding their daughter.

I want to thank Netgalley and the author for gifting me the ebook. A good historical fiction WWII novel. Highly recommend

After getting word that all foreigners must report to an internment camp, Vera is faced with an impossible choice. Should she take her French born daughter with her or leave Lucie hidden with her governess until she can return? Believing the safest option is to keep her away from the trauma of the camp, Vera leaves Lucie behind saying she would be back soon. As the horrors of the war begin to increase, Vera is forced to flee across the ocean. The time separated from her daughter is filled with pain, worry and speculation when letters and news from France is slow to arrive and then not at all. Determined to be reunited with Lucie and strongly believing she survived the war, Vera's only goal is to once again set sail for France and journey on until she discovers Lucie's fate. This was a difficult book to read as a parent. I can't imagine the anxiety that was felt by so many in this situation not knowing where their children were, how they were or if they were even alive. I don't know if my nerves could have handled this. The story in parts dragged on a bit and could have possibly done without some of the narrative, especially in Sasha's POV when for me the Vera/Lucie storyline was the main focus. If you are a His Fic fan, I'm sure you would enjoy this if you are looking for a new read. For me it was a bit of a slow roll.

I got this book as an arc, but just couldn't get into it. I think it was just a slow start.
I just now got back to it and listened to it on audiobook.
I thought it was slow going in places, but I really felt for this little girl, being separated from her mother, not knowing what happened to her. It was such a heartbreaking time in history and families had to go through so much, being separated and not knowing what happened to their loved ones. Her Mom made a decision that helped save her girls life.
It also made me angry towards the end when the Nun lied to the mother and the reasoning behind it. Though, I totally can see that happening.

Thank you to netgalley.com for this ARC.

Although this was another book set during World War II but told from an interesting angle. It tells the story of a Jewish woman living in France with her husband and daughter. They decide to leave the daughter with her non-Jewish nanny during the initial roundups. They eventually escape to USA but leave the daughter behind thinking she will be safer there. The rest of the book deals with a mothers guilt, a sons guilt, the difficulties of war, as well as love, courage, and hope.

I really enjoyed this book as heartbreaking as it was at times.

I have recommended this book to so many people. Alexis Landau is an amazing storyteller and brings a well-researched book to life, showing how strong a mother’s determination to never give up hope in reconnecting with her daughter can truly be in a time of war. A great story of hope and resilience.

Another heartbreaking, dramatic WWII book that didn't hold up for me. I finished mostly because I don't like leaving a book, hoping as I get through it I would enjoy it more. The book was cluttered with characters that didn't seem to have much purpose. In any event my thanks to NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

An impossible decision haunts Vera, a Russian Jewish emigre living in France at the beginning of WWII. As the Nazis begin rounding up foreign-born Jews, Vera sends her 4-year-old-daughter Lucie into hiding with her trusted French governess. Expecting to retrieve her after a few weeks, Vera instead finds herself forced to flee for her life with her husband, Max, over the Pyrenes Mountains to Spain and ultimately to America.

Meanwhile, Lucie hides with her governess on the Catholic family's farm until her presence puts them all at risk. The governess' letters to Vera stop coming once the Nazis occupy the Free French Zone. Then word comes that the entire village where they are hiding is slaughtered by the Nazis in retribution for villages aiding the Resistance.

In America, Vera is convinced Lucie still lives as Max tries to move forward and establish a new life in California. But Vera can't let go. With her marriage splintering, Vera meets Sasha, a war veteran who also is searching for meaning in his life. With Sasha's support, Vera plans to return to France as soon as the war ends to search for Lucie.

This was a hard book to read at times, but I'm glad I stayed with it. Thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Group Putnam for an advanced reader copy. Three and half stars.

Heart-wrenching! Stories about WWII often are. Vera was lucky, as she calls it, but is wracked with guilt about family choices she made while being forced into internment. I don't know what I would've done in her place! Her inner turmoil and uncertainty is tragic to read.

Historical fiction is one of my favorite genres so I find myself rather particular about the books I will spend my time reading. Landau provides us with a beautiful story in Those Who Are Saved. This book is told in three perspectives set during the second world war. The emotions on the pages were tangible and beautiful. I recommend fully for fans of the genre and time period. It was unique and not the every day run of the mill WW2 fiction.

I couldn't image making the choice that Vera had to make. Not knowing if they were ever see each other again. But then a mother will do whatever it takes to protect her children. And no doubt the choice Vera had to make in the pages of this novel was the very rare choices during the war.

I am blown away by this novel! It was so beautifully written, and just such an emotional journey to follow! The story was one that will stick with your heart for quite some time. I recommend this to any historical fiction reader! Vera was a very strong woman, one who had to make decisions that I could not imagine! Thank you Netgalley for this ARC!

I love books that are written about WWII. This story is told from a mother’s perspective. What Vera is forced to do in order to protect her daughter, the guilt and grief she experiences, and the devastation she witnesses when she returns to France after the war is emotionally moving. Definitely a heartwrenching tale of a mother’s ultimate love.

Thank you to NetGalley and G. P. Putnam’s Sons for my advanced review copy. All opinions and thoughts are my own.

An interesting, and emotional novel about WWII. Russian parents are forced to leave their daughter as they escape France. It became an odyssey to be reunited. I thought the story was plausible. I felt sorry for Lucie’s character as I think she was put through the most challenges. Wrenching decisions had to be made, sometimes with devastating consequences.

Vera and her husband Max left Russia, and the family is happy living in France. They are a wealthy family and life is good. When the Nazis occupy Paris, they issue an order that Jews must be put in camps. Vera decides that Lucie would be better off with her governess Agnes and she tells Lucie she’ll come get her when she can. Agnes loves Lucie
The family that is watching Lucie moves to a rural part of France, and Vera and her husband escape to the United States. After the war is over, Vera is determined to find Lucie, and she teams up with a man named Sasha when is also searching in France.
I can’t imagine how difficult the decision would be to send my child away, but mothers will do anything to protect their children. The guilt would be crushing, as it was in the book. I like it, but it was a slow read and the ending felt rushed. 4 stars.
Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

There are many stories written about this time period and the desperate choices that Jewish people had to make in order to survive, but not many deal with families having to leave their children in order to protect them. This intrigued me. I wish that the author would have spent more time with Vera's search to get her daughter back and not rushed through it at the end of the book. The character of Sasha and his story never connected with the rest of the story and at the end of the book you are left wondering what it was all about.

“Those Who Are Saved” is the second novel Los Angeles author Alexis Landau has written. It is historical fiction set during the WWII era, and the author included an extensive bibliography at the end of the novel which is always a good indicator of the authenticity of the “voice” of the book. In this case, it is historically accurate most—but not all—of the time.

But it is NOT typical WWII fiction. Although the three main protagonists of the book are European Jews, much of the novel is set surreally in the world of the film industry and Southern California while WWII is being fought in Europe. And a romance between two of the characters features prominently in the book. It was compelling reading at many points, but it was honestly disconcerting to me to vicariously be in Hollywood when I knew what was going on in Europe and wanted to know what was going on there and how it affected the protagonists. It was fairly introspective examining how the protagonists were feeling at times when I wanted to know more about what was “ happening “. A reviewer from the Jewish Book Council also mentioned this in their review.

The novel opens in France in the year 1940 with the German inva­sion of that country. Vera, a successful novelist, and Max, her composer husband, listen to information about the invasion from an idyllic country home in southern France— although they have resided primarily in Paris since their Russian Jewish families escaped there in the 1920s. They consider themselves French, but they are for­eign-born Jews, and they dutifully turn themselves in for internment when they hear those instructions from the government. They make a decision, however, that haunts the rest of the novel. They send their four-year-daughter, Lucie, to stay with their daughter’s nonJewish French nanny, Agnes, and her family thinking the internment won’t last long. Although Agnes is not anti-Semitic, her family is—and she is eventually forced to leave Lucie at a Catholic boarding school for safety when the Nazis occupy their town. Vera and Max even­tu­al­ly escape France and the camp (without much time being spent on this)and make it to Los Ange­les, forced by cir­cum­stances to leave with­out the child. Max gets a job in the film industry. Will Lucie survive the war? Will Agnes? Will Vera and Max ever find her again is she does?

From the book not long after Vera is at the internment camp:

“Some of the women envied Vera for having managed to stow Lucie away somewhere safe and clean. When they noticed Vera staring at their children, they would say in their light chattering way, “Oh, but it’s really better. This place is a disgrace. Just look at this soup, nothing but diluted broth,” holding the half-filled spoon under Vera’s nose. For a few moments, Vera felt consoled, even flattered, that perhaps they thought she was a better mother, a more cautious mother, for having sent her daughter to the country, but doubt always returned.

What had she done?

It was a huge mistake. She should have kept Lucie with her no matter what.

• • •

Once, in the early dawn, while the women dressed and she lay still on her pallet, feigning sleep, she overhead them.

“Poor Vera. Can you imagine?” one of them whispered.

“Absolutely not,” another mother hissed. “I would never leave my child, not under any circumstances. I must see him, touch him. How else can you know if your child is truly well?”

The question hung in the air long after the women finished dressing and left. It hung there every night as Vera tossed and turned. After many wakeful hours, she often fell into a deep sleep just before dawn broke.”

Another protagonist in the book is Sasha. Sasha ,too, is a Russian Jewish emigre, but he and his mother come to 1920s New York from a poor shtetl and end up in New York’s Lower East side making his backstory different from the wealthy upper crust Vera and Max.

Sasha dreams of being a writer and director of movies and is on the verge of his first break­through when World War II reach­es the Unit­ed States. So, again, the author paints a picture of LA during the WWII era until the point when Sasha does eventually end up joining the American invasion of Europe when they join the war.

From the book after Sasha has returned from the fighting in Europe:

“He wanted to make a film about the war, but not the war itself; he had no idea how to capture the vastness and scale of what he’d seen, and everyone knew war was hell. They didn’t need a movie to remind them. More interesting was the war’s psychological effect on those who returned, on their morality and their sense of justice after witnessing so much senseless bloodshed. How could they all live in the world again, after years of violence, willfully forgetting their humanity to survive? Turning this over in his mind, Sasha began to sweat, remembering the men in his unit who were hit by friendly fire a few days after Normandy, and how they had to swiftly bury them and move on. Or the time his friend Nick killed an Italian soldier who was running toward them, surrendering, yelling with his hands up, but Nick, in a panic, started shooting, and when they went over to the body, they saw the soldier was only a kid, fifteen at most. How, Sasha wondered, would these guys return to their office jobs, pushing paper across a desk, looking presentable in a gray flannel suit, after what they’d seen?”

Thank you to the publisher G.P. Putnam’s Sons and NetGalley for the Advanced Reader’s Copy of this book and for allowing me to review it. ( publication date 23 February 2021).

A heart-wrenching story of a mother and her love for her child, this book explores the themes of family, identity, and separation. I loved the Los Angeles setting and the fresh-feeling take on stories of World War II.

Those Who Are Saved by Alexis Landau

Brief Summary: Vera is a Russian Jewish migrant ordered to an internment camp when the Nazis march into France. She makes the heart-wrenching decision to leave four-year-old Lucie with her governess thinking the war will be short term. Unfortunately, to keep Lucie safe, her governess takes her to southern France and Vera must seize an opportunity for passage to America. This is her story to find Lucie after the war.

Highlights: By far the best storyline was Lucie’s; especially when she was hiding from the Nazis under the care of the nuns. Unfortunately, this story did not suck me in. It moved really slowly and Vera didn’t actively look for Lucie until the end of the book. I’m not sure I fully understood the role of some characters(e.g. Sasha).

Explanation of Rating: 3/5; this premise had so much potential but it was hard to get into

Thank you to Net Galley and the Penguin Group Putnam for an ARC of this novel in exchange for an honest review

Note to Publisher: I’m sorry this review is late. I was hospitalized for a GI Bleed and only recently started to feel better and catch up on reading and reviewing.

Enjoyable read. A bit slow at times. I enjoyed the multiple views from different characters. Would have been nice to have Max's views as well. Vera was a likeable character who I had compassion for. Sasha as well. I will recommend this book for purchase!