Customer Reviews

The Innocents Within

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I found Robert Daley's "The Innocents Within" to be a fascinating look into a part of World War II that I had never read about before. We all know of the invasion of Normandy, the fall and liberation of Paris, the bitterness of the Nazi occupation of the country. But Mr. Daley's moving story about simple people preyed upon by war in a poor, little known, "unglamorous" part of France, was, for me, both interesting and powerful. In a time when moral decisions seem to be hedged or clouded, Mr. Daley's story of Pastor Andre Favert rings with a refreshing and reassuring clarity. The book's portrayal of a Protestant minister who saves the lives of thousands of Jews (and others), despite physical and spiritual trials, reveals a rare heroism, rarer still because it is paterned aftr a true story. Of course, like all strong books, "The Innocents Within" is made up of more than one story and it is the intertwining of these several threads that moves the book forward at a brisk pace. I found the rather improbable love story between the downed American pilot and the pastor's adopted Jewish daughter to be a touching counterpart to Nazi brutality and to the senseless repugnance of war. Despite the horrors, the cruelty, the poverty of place and time, Mr. Daley's message is still one of hope, personified by Andre Favert. For me, "The Innocents Within" is a "real book, adult in the best sense of the word and a rich, satisfying read.

This book kept me up later than I wanted to be up. The blending of history and deeply evolved characters make for a worthwhile investment of precious time. I was interested to see the New York Times (Oct 29, 1999) interview with Mr. Daley which took place in the town where these brave people stood up for what was right. DON'T MISS THIS ONE-an excellent book!

A fascinating story of people trapped in Nazi occupied France in World War II. The author knows his subject, the terrain, the characters, and all the small details of the time and the situations described. The sole defect of this book is that the author tells his tale so straight and somehow at-a-distance that the author does not seem to care who wins or loses and thus, neither does the reader. The author also does unnecessay embellishment; for instance we read pages of background on a priest - a minor character who appears briefly - for no apparent reason. Robert Daley is a craftsman who does a good job of writing - but he neither varnishes nor polishes his work. Good while you read it, but soon forgotten when you put it down.

The Innocents Within by Robert Daley: A well-written novel describing explicitly realistically the possible daily routine in occupied France during the Second World War. Robert Daley has developed convincing characters, ranging from a Protestant minister down to a French farmer, whose reactions to the occupying German forces appear to be such a credible description that the novel reads more like a personal history. Into the complex arena of occupied France, Mr. Daley pops in (literally) a shot-down American flier. (I wondered why Daley had the American pilot, David Gannon, attending Fordham University, until I looked up the author's biography and saw that R. Daley had graduated from Fordham in 1951.) Davey, the downed and wounded American pilot, has to be cared for by the stepdaughter of the minister, Andre Favert, and, as usual, one thing leads to another, and the pilot and the daughter are doing what comes naturally. Daley excels in describing naturally occurring events, as the drive in the snow to the prison, the tracks the farmer left behind when he drew the gasoline from crashed American plane, and the treatment of the farmer, his farm and his animals when the Germans discover that the farmer had helped the American airman. For example, the author has the German soldiers not just killing the pigs, but butchering them and taking away the hams. This presents the picture of a group of men destroying a farm, killing the farmer and all the while considering what they were going to do for dinner after the "work" was done. Daley does not completely develop the German characters, in my opinion, as the German soldiers are depicted more as grasping and thieving individuals, rather than fanatics of an army of Master-Race

Mr. Daley has done it again. The dramatic account of a youngAmerican pilot, Jewish girl and heroic gentiles risking their livesmakes for a truly energetic and gripping plot. I tried to savor the story, and make it last, but I had to stay up late to finish or not be able to fall asleep, too anxious to find out how all these fascinating characters would turn out. I loved this book and would recommend it for its historical drama, realistic romance, and superb turn of events

This is an interesting throwback to the oft told stories about WWII and the resistance in France. The ending seemed rather abrupt considering how the author gave such minute details to the events which preceded the conclusion. I had hoped there would be some sort of epilogue telling what happened to the characters (supposedly based on a true incident) and what happened to the village in which the story was set.

In the author's notes, at the end of this book, the author states clearly that this is a work of fiction but based on events that happened at" that time and in that place". However, if it's based on events why was it necessary to distort those events, to distort the characters of the main players, Pastor Andre & Magda Trocme, and to invent situations that absolutely did not take place? Borrowing from the book written by Professor Hallie in 1979, "Lest Innocent Blood Be Shed" and from Pierre Sauvage's excellent documentary film of 1989, "Weapons Of The Spirit", the author takes his story from these two important sources without the elementary courtesy of giving credit to them. Could he have not done more of his "homework" by speaking to the many witnesses still alive in France, U.S. and Israel, the documents available in Le Chambon itself, at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, at Swarthmore University and most prominently at the Chambon Foundation in Los Angeles? He apparently thought that he knew better. Adding sex and violence to the place"where 5000 Christians saved 5000 Jews", does not add anything positive to the true events. If the author tried to make the book "as accurate as I could make it", he has a strange notion of what accuracy is. Completely baffling is his remark that this book "may have more truth in it than the non-fiction accounts so far written", almost an Orwellian concept. The way the book ends is absolutely ridiculous and desecrates the memory of Pastor Trocme. The events that took place in Le Chambon during World War II, are one of the moral mysteries of that time and a profound lesson to all of us about what can happen, when Christians apply Christian doctrines to their everyday lives. This story did not need rescuing from oblivion by Robert Daley.

Generally, this new novel from veteran author Robert Daley is absorbing and includes several richly drawn characters. However, the love story is fairly trivial and the ending lacks tension.

Daley was a foreign correspondent in Paris for several years, is married to a French woman, and in several of his previous works has brought France and its culture to life, as very few American novelists can.

In this new book, I didn't feel that Daley dug into French culture as well as he has done in his earlier books, particularly the long-out-of-print "Strong Wine Red As Blood".

Daley is not an elegant writer, but he is an expert storyteller, albeit one who occasionally descends to the level of pulp fiction. His work deserves to be more widely read, and hopefully the kind of story he tells here will find a wider audience than his police stories.

I have to admit that I read less than three novels per year (non-fiction being my interest). This said, Daley's Innocents captures the reader in a real-life setting wrapped around a compelling love story. The author obviously has first-hand experience with airplanes, WW II, and falling deeply in love. I wonder if I would have put my own family at risk to shelter refugees, as these courageous French families did. Would you?

An American fighter pilot gets shot down in occupied France. A Protestant pastor goads his village parishioners into sheltering Jewish refugees. One of the refugees, a pretty young girl, hides with him and becomes his adopted daughter. A young Jew learns to forge documents, and hides in a nearby farm.

These are the elements of Robert Daley's The Innocents Within, a novel that should be more compelling than it is. When the pilot shelters with the pastor's family while the pastor himself has been temporarily arrested by the government. He (of course) falls in love with the girl, and meanwhile other wheels turn, each affecting the others.

All of these elements are interesting, and the story itself is compelling, but the story is told in such flat, disinterested tones that nothing comes across as important, and the story is robbed of some of its suspense. It is, at times, affecting though. While the story sags in the middle somewhat, it does pick up somewhat towards the end.