Review: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

When I first started blogging this summer, I read a lot about The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows, so I went out and bought it.  Then, I let it sit on the shelf for a while because I was afraid my expectations were too high.  Boy, was I wrong.  I loved this book – it was even better than I expected.

This book is written as a series of letters.  World War II has just ended and Juliet Ashton, who is an author, is living in London when she receives a  letter from Dawsey Adams who lives on Guernsey, one of the Channel Islands.  Dawsey has an old book that had belonged to Juliet at one time.  In his letter he mentions the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, a sort of book club, that sprang up because of the German occupation of Guernsey during World War II.  This leads to a flurry of letters between Juliet and members of the Society.  Juliet decides there might be a book in the story of the lives of these people and decides to visit Guernsey.  Once there, she falls in love with the island and it’s people.

One of my favorite lines in the book is in a letter from Juliet to Dawsey when she says, “That’s what I love about reading: one tiny thing will interest you in a book, and that tiny thing will lead you onto another book, and another bit there will lead you onto a third book.  It’s geometrically progressive – all with no end in sight, and for no other reason than sheer enjoyment.”  This book is charming and delightful.  It made me want to visit Guernsey and made me miss the art of letter writing.  This book counts for my Fall Into Reading Challenge.