Falade writes from a different perspective on post-World War II Paris. The opening chapter explains that Cecile Rosenbaum’s bourgeois parents had enrolled her in a Catholic school before the Germans arrived. The second chapter is set after the war, in May 1947, when Cecile is on a bus traveling to a Communist Youth Conference where she meets Minette Traore, a beautiful black girl whose parents were French and Senegalese. Through Minette, Cecile meets Sebastian “Seb” Danxome, a 22 year old handyman who wished to pursue a career as an architect and was seeking to enroll at Beaux-Arts, a renowned art school. As they embark on a relationship, Cecile learns that Seb’s father, who lived in Dahomey, had sent Seb and his older sister, Jacqueline (“Zansi”), to France to pursue their studies when Seb was only seven and Zansi was nine. They were “viewed as objects of curiosity and treated no better than trained monkeys.” But Zansi’s supple mind and her tireless drive enabled them to survive and flourish in France. Zansi’s mentor helped find Seb an apprenticeship with a village carpenter in Burgundy away from “Nazis bored with Jew-chasing who might take an interest in a rarity like an African boy.”

Seb knew that Zansi would disapprove of his relationship with Cecile because she was White, French, not African, and not Dahomeyan, so he kept the relationship a secret, and ultimately broke it off. Because he could not win back Cecile’s trust without knowing answers to his own questions about his family and obligations, Seb researched his father, an intellectual and a journalist, in the archives. He knew that his father had been raised by priests after his own father’s exile, and that he was a colonial subject and a French citizen of royal heritage but classically educated.

Cecile, still upset that Seb would not publicly claim her as his lover, meets the strikingly handsome black GI, Mack Gay, from Kansas City. In contrast to Seb’s avoidance, Mack immediately referred to Cecile as his “baby.” Although Mack had planned to return to KC after leaving the service. Mack’s mother responded to a picture that he sent of he and Cecile: “Do not bring that girl here. Are you crazy! Across the river, you two ain’t even legal. Cecile’s mother is also disturbed that her daughter “would be so enamored of blacks.” She explained in her journal: “I don’t care that the boy who loves my daughter is black — not one white! I do fear that the world may not be ready to see them together. That the world is wrongheaded matters little if the result is my daughter’s suffering.”

Despite the hostility of family to these inter-racial relationships, the novel charts Cecile’s love for these “maddening black men”: “one American, the other African; one the descendant of slaves, the other of slavers; one light with joy, though enigmatic, the other burdened by prodigious responsibility that he was incapable of meeting.” Falade dramatizes issues of race in post-war Paris, but Cecile’s politics are underdeveloped. Other than wearing a Jewish star as a provocation, and attending some rallies, it is not clear why or if Cecile is attracted to communism or what her political leanings are in a turbulent post-war Paris. Thank you Atlantic Monthly Press and Net Galley for an advanced copy of this novel that transports the reader to volatile post war Paris.

Thank you Netgalley & Atlantic Monthly Press for an eARC ♥️

This book is like a rich French coffee - it's got depth, complexity, and a hint of revolution.

Cecile and Seb's stories are woven together like a beautiful tapestry, with threads of identity, love, and politics. You'll feel fully immersed in the vibrant world of 1947 Paris, with its jazz clubs, cafes, and protests unfolding before your eyes.
I loved how David Wright Faladé explored the tensions between different cultures and ideologies, and how the characters navigated those complexities. It's a powerful reminder that even in the midst of uncertainty, there's always hope for a better future.
What I loved most? The way the author balances the big-picture history with the intimate, personal moments. It's like getting a glimpse into a private diary - you feel like you're experiencing it all firsthand.♥️
The writing is gorgeous, too - vivid descriptions of the city, the music, and the people. You'll feel like you're strolling along the Seine, sipping coffee at a charming café, or dancing the night away to jazz.

If you're looking for a book that'll transport you to another era, make you think, and maybe even inspire you to change the world... this is the one!♥️

An atmospheric novel of four young idealists in post War Paris. Would these four have gotten to know one another in another city? Unlikely, but the fact that they met and engaged with one another changed all of their world outlooks even as the world looked at them askance. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. For fans of literary fiction.

The New Internationals chronicles Paris during the post war era through the eyes of four individuals. Cecile Rosenbaum, is from a Jewish family that lost everything, meets Minette Traoré, a French girl with Senegalese decent, meet on the way to a Communist Youth Conference. There they meet Sebastien Danxomè from West Africa. They meet Mack Gray, an African American GI. Relationships and ideals are tested and questions as these four grow in a post war world.

The New Internationals was a good story full of nuance and a great look into a colorful and powerful era.

Thank you, NetGalley & Grove Atlantic for the ARC. #TheNewInternationals #NetGalley.

I was incredibly excited to read this book, since it sets out to chronicle one of the most fascinating eras of twentieth century history. The post-war reckoning and cultural revolution - and the birth of a defiant, creative and fearless generation. Not to mention the anti-Colonial struggle which rocked the fabric of France (among many other ailing empires). David Wright Falade captures the volatility of the period masterfully, and threads through a stirring, cross-cultural romance. I loved every page.

Well written, intelligent novel that is a mix of coming of age and cross cultural romance during a post War Paris. Well done!

David Wright Falade’s “The New Internationals,” which installs its idealistic leftist-minded young principals in post-World War II France when tensions were still running high over its colonialist past in West Africa, will likely prove something of a challenge for not-so-internationally-minded American readers. Not so foreign for me, though, the novel’s concerns, with how I grew up in a military family whose tours included three years in France at a time not too distant from that of the novel’s action.
When, for instance, Cecile, a young white Jew whose grandmother was taken during the Occupation, shows Paris to her newfound friend and lover-to-be Mack, a black American GI with musical inclinations, their walk through the city, including the Champs-Élysées and an area where, Cecil notes, German generals kept their mistresses during the Occupation, had me recalling how my brother and I took a quick stroll along the Champs-Élysées just before our flight back to the States from Orly. And when Mack is confronted by his black commanding officer for having diverted items from the commissary for black-market trading, the military milieu of the transgression was quite familiar to me, with my having frequented commissaries and PXs and the like throughout my childhood. And the novel’s French-Algerian tensions reminded me of the day when the American school I attended was dismissed early for fear of violence.
So as I say, not so foreign for me, the novel’s concerns, though even with my more cosmopolitan background there was still some confusion, as there always is for me in novels having to do with the Occupation, in no small part because of the acronyms for the various factions. Also, the buildup to the novel’s explosive climax, which draws together the principals in a melee of violence, proved a bit tedious for me.
Still, an interesting and compelling look at the postwar period in France, Falade’s book, and especially timely now, with France having just made a gesture of remembrance for African troops shot dead on French army orders in Senegal during World War II.