《莎拉的钥匙》

De Rosnay's U.S. debut fictionalizes* the 1942 Paris roundups* and deportations*, in which thousands of Jewish families were arrested, held at the Vélodrome d'Hiver outside the city, then transported to Auschwitz.

Forty-five-year-old Julia Jarmond, American by birth, moved to Paris when she was 20 and is married to the arrogant*, unfaithful Bertrand Tézac, with whom she has an 11-year-old daughter.

Julia writes for an American magazine and her editor assigns her to cover the 60th anniversary of the Vél' d'Hiv' roundups. Julia soon learns that the apartment she and Bertrand plan to move into was acquired by Bertrand's family when its Jewish occupants were dispossessed* and deported 60 years before.

She resolves to find out what happened to the former occupants*: Wladyslaw and Rywka Starzynski, parents of 10-year-old Sarah and four-year-old Michel.

The more Julia discovers—especially about Sarah, the only member of the Starzynski family to survive*—the more she uncovers about Bertrand's family, about France and, finally, herself.

Already translated into 15 languages, the novel is De Rosnay's 10th book (but her first written in English, her first language). It beautifully conveys Julia's conflicting* loyalties*, and makes Sarah's trials* so riveting*, her innocence so absorbing*, that the book is hard to put down.

fictionalize 把(历史事件)编成小说 roundup 搜捕 deportation 放逐 arrogant 傲慢的 dispossess 撵走 occupant 居住着 survive 幸存 conflicting 冲突的 loyalty 忠诚 trial 审判 riveting 引人入胜的 absorbing 吸引人的