‘How Angels Die’ 5 Star Review from Readers Favorite!

 ***** Reviewed by Alice D. for Readers Favorite

“How Angels Die” tells of Claire McCleash of Irish descent who lives with her mother, Estelle, father Sean and sister Monique in France during World War II. Claire hates bicycling along the French beachline where she and her friends once played for now it is filled with miles of barbed wire and with German concrete pillboxes containing machine guns. As part of the French Resistance, Claire and her school friends go from throwing rocks at Nazi vehicles to shooting at the German soldiers with guns. Monique, however, prefers to dress up at night and go to nightclubs where she intermingles with Nazi officers and passes what information she learns on to French Resistance fighters. Monique and a German officer, Pieter Von Strausser, fall in love and into bed together, while Claire is ambushing Nazi patrols. Monique visits a French orphanage to play with the children there, but why is the little girl Essey so very special to her? And will Claire learn to accept what Monique is doing?

“How Angels Die” is a brilliantly written account of life in France during the Nazi occupation of World War II. All characters are believable and sympathetic, especially Monique and her Nazi lover, Pieter Von Strausser, Claire and her parents who are caught up in abnormal everyday living in the time of war. The plot spares the reader none of the horrors of those years of the French Resistance. The story’s ending is powerful, believable and unforgettable as the reader learns of the bravery of people now long dead and forgotten.

Written by

David-Michael Harding is a life-long writer whose work has appeared in numerous national publications. His historical short story, “Forever Beneath the Celtic Sea,” which details the sinking of the passenger liner Lusitania, was runner-up in the Southeast Regional Arts Council Awards. His novella, The Cats of Savone was the recipient of an International PEN Award. He holds a master’s degree in education, and currently works as an adjunct professor of writing and resides in Tampa, Florida. Most of his days are spent writing from the cockpit of his sailboat, Pegasus, somewhere off the Nature Coast of Florida in the Gulf of Mexico.

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