Lead Review (Epic Annette)

• Book: Epic Annette: A Heroine’s Tale
• Location: France
• Author: Anne Weber, Tess Lewis (Translator)

Review Author: tripfiction

3.5*
This is the story of Annette Beaumanoir, and this ‘heroic epic’ is told in an unusual poetic free verse narrative. The lines are irregularly typeset, with a single word often placed centre stage, creating quite a dramatic effect. It is told in the present tense and that gives the whole story a degree of immediacy, if not urgency, whipping the prose along. The author allows herself some asides as she tells Anne’s story, almost as if she is talking to the reader. The style is inspired, of course, by Homer.

It starts with Annette’s birth in Brittany and follows her story through to Paris during the war years, around France and then beyond to Algerian independence. It canters along at a brisk clip as the stages of her life are detailed. She marries, she has children, she lives a normal life, but her passion for what is right guides her actions.

In 1940, Paris is occupied by the “Verdigris” (the Germans) and she is engaged in resistance activities – two children need a safe passage and lodging and she is the one to escort them.

“She’s fighting for a future that is as radiant and just as possible…”

After the war she is still asked to take part in covert surveillance and family B are suspect, running a banana business and selling to the Germans. She takes on the whole task with exceptional enthusiasm and dedication, yet has her reservations. She then becomes engulfed by the plight of the Algerians and their fight for independence from France. Her passion is her be all and end all and it is good that her life is recorded in this book, allowing the reader to be introduced to this brave woman.

This is not an everyday read and it can feel almost breathless as it gallops through this woman’s life, allowing little time for reflection. I would have loved to find out more about Annette’s motivation, her emotional and mental states, which would have added so much more to this largely objective portrayal of her life as it moved through the years.

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