The Light Behind The Window: A breathtaking story of love and war from the bestselling author of The Seven Sisters series

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The detail is extraordinary - a superb history lesson. She's a wonderful storyteller. This is another really exciting, gripping story. I've got all her books.

The author has a skill in drawing you right into the characters lives so much so that you experience all that they do and just as you think you know the outcome or the next stage in their development, it is shifted again. A veritable tease in some ways a good skill of holding the reader's attention in others. I did not want this book to end, it could have been double the size and I still would have wanted to learn more about both the past and the present.I was completely taken in by the story, I loved the story and will be passing it onto my Nan so she can read it (When it arrived in the post she was instantly eyeing it up!). I will definitely be talking and spreading the word about Lucinda’s new novel. Emilie de la Martinieres is the sole surviving member of her family and is left with a chateau with vineyards and another home in Paris. Both homes are filled with memories and contents worth millions. But, the millions won't be Emile's because of the debt her mother mounted over the years. Emilie needs to decide if she should sell or keep the chateau. She never had to deal with finances and was doing it alone until a complete stranger, Sebastian, came on the scene.

The detailed descriptions of the castle, the French society during WWII, the hint of mystery about the de la Martinieries' history, and the current-day love story make this book another amazing, mesmerizing, and fantastic Lucinda Riley novel. A sweeping, engrossing work. Riley is talented, delighting in the small details of aristocratic luxury and the pastoral countryside . . . The heroines of [The Light Behind the Window] struggle to master circumstances seemingly beyond their control, a common thread in Riley's work. A tale of family secrets, wartime espionage, and loyalties gained and gambled, The Lavender Garden will appeal to fans of historical fiction, Kate Morton, and Helen Bryan If I can't give a book an honest 3 stars, it hasn't worked for me. I don't rate them 1 or 2 because I personally think this gives people a false picture, but I do try and explain. So it was with this on. The characters in The Light Behind The Window are exceptional, I became very emotionally involved with them, especially Emilie and Constance. I thought that they were such fantastically written characters. Constance in particular showed such courage and strength in the story and it touched my heart, I really enjoyed reading her part of the story and her journey was a very emotional one. Lucinda Riley has not only created two outstanding main characters, but has excelled in her supporting cast, Sebastian and Alex really stood out for me in that category, not forgetting Sophia as well.I don't understand why so many people seem to want to write books about women in SOE that in fact aren't about what women in SOE did. Or at least, I thought this would be about a woman in SOE (along with a related story set in the more or less present day), but apparently it wanted to be a soapy drama. Which could have been okay, except that it was so clunky and flat. Though she brought up her four children mostly in Norfolk in England, in 2015 she fulfilled her dream of buying a remote farmhouse in West Cork, Ireland, which she always felt was her spiritual home, and indeed this was where her last five books were written. I have read most of Lucinda Riley’s books including the Seven Sisters series. They are all very good novels but I really enjoyed this one. The events surrounding World War Two are particularly moving and realistic. Highly recommended. Yet again Lucinda Riley has created and weaved a story which has you gripped from the beginning to the end. You have to keep reading, you have to know what happens you have to know if love will conquer all, if war will end, if all wrongs will be righted and that the light will shine again from behind the window where it has been hiding for many years of the main characters. Just one other thing before I wrap this one up. The way Emilie throws in at the very end that she can’t have kids feels rushed and makes zero sense. It doesn’t add anything to the story. Yes, there’s Anton but that storyline could’ve happened without her whole melt down. I just personally think that that scene was random and poorly done.

I wasn't sorry, it was such a touching and gripping story i couldnt stop listening to it! You really get the characters and feel their emotions, The narrator read it so well too, highly recommended. Emilie de la Martinieres is there when her glamorous mother draws her final breath. As the end comes, Emilie realises what a task she now has to face, as the sole remaining heir she has to sort a flat in Paris, her mother's jewels and other remnants of her famous and glamorous life as well as the Chateau in the south of France, which her mother hated, but Emilie loved as a child when her father was alive. The incredible bravery of the SOE, the Resistance and the ordinary French men and women is movingly told; I'm a Brit used to war stories told from home soil and am ashamed to say how little I know about day to day occupied France. That's not to say this is a gritty war book though, far from it. There are some tense moments, but they're dealt with 'nicely' with only hints of the horrors that happen off-screen. The main body of this book is how the long-lost secrets of the past affect the future generations.Lucinda Riley was born in 1965 in Ireland and, after an early career as an actress in film, theatre and television, wrote her first novel aged twenty-four. Her books have been translated into thirty-seven languages and continue to strike an emotional chord with cultures all around the world. The Seven Sisters series specifically has become a global phenomenon, creating its own genre. This one is classified as historical fiction and that it is. I have no qualms with that. However, that’s probably my only non-objection to this one. Lucinda Riley attempts to interweave the stories of Emilie de la Martinières, a young French woman who recently inherited a vast fortune after her mother’s death, and Constance Carruthers, a young English woman who was sent to France during World War II as a special operative. Riley then tells the reader how these two women, decades apart, are intertwined. The potential this story had was immense but unfortunately it remains just that - potential. Booklist A fast-paced, suspenseful story flitting between the present day and World War II . . . Riley expertly weaves Emilie's story into a dual narrative . . . A real old-fashioned romance which manages to have a compelling narrative as well as something of a history lesson in the Special Operations Executive. Brilliant escapism

In collaboration with her son Harry Whittaker, she also devised and wrote a series of books for children called The Guardian Angels. THE LAVENDER GARDEN had wonderful characters that were believable as well as characters that you would want to share a day with. Being in a beautiful chateau with a vineyard, being in Paris and a small French village, being in an English castle, and being with characters you definitely will bond with made the book even more appealing. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the topic whether a fan of Lucinda Riley's or not. Her books have been nominated for numerous awards, including the Italian Bancarella Prize, the Lovely Books Award in Germany, and the Romantic Novel of the Year Award. In 2020 she received the Dutch Platinum Award for sales over 300,000 copies for a single novel in one year – a prize last won by J. K. Rowling for Harry Potter. TW; rape (I put it in one of the spoilers, but just in case someone wants to go through and read them all.)

Castles, hidden rooms, families, World War II, and history coming alive as past and present blend together for an incredible, marvelously detailed read. But the crowning idiocy is at the convergence of the two stories: After the war ends what on earth is the justification for not telling Frederik about his daughter?! And he just doesn't care! "You lied to me about my child for 55 years and only told me she existed after she died so I had no hope of ever having a relationship with her, but hey, water under the bridge!" And Emilie and Jean congratulate Jacques on how wise this decision was. (?!) It was baffling and silly and nonsensical. The Light Behind The Window: A breathtaking story of love and war from the bestselling author of The Seven Sisters series