Historical Fiction · Free kit
The Nightingale
Occupied France, 1939 to 1945: two Rossignol sisters, years and temperament apart, take different roads through the same war. Vianne Mauriac stays in the garden house at Carriveau with her daughter Sophie after her husband Antoine is taken prisoner, and learns what it costs to keep a child alive with German officers in the spare room. Isabelle, expelled and hungry to be useful, walks into the Resistance and becomes the Nightingale — the passeur who leads Allied airmen over the Pyrenees. Hannah braids their choices with a 1995 Oregon frame: an elderly woman, a trunk, an identity card that says Juliette Gervaise, and the question of which sister's war the people who love her were ever allowed to know.
“If I have learned anything in this long life of mine, it is this: In love we find out who we want to be; in war we find out who we are.”
Complete free book club kit
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Plan your meeting
The Nightingale Printables
Get the full printable pack on Etsy, or print individual pages from Bingo, Discussion Questions, and Hosting.
Nightingale sticker sheet
Die-cut stickers inspired by a bird, a garden gate, a false identity card, a mountain pass, and a sprig of lavender — for journals or meeting favors.
Included in printable pack
Favorite quote cards
Blank cards for the line that stayed: the love-and-war opening, wanting to be known, or whatever your group underlined in Carriveau.
Included in printable pack
Sisters cheat sheet
A one-page who-is-who for Vianne, Isabelle, Julien, Beck, Von Richter, Rachel, Ari/Daniel, Gaëtan, and Antoine — plus which name is a bird — so the meeting does not spend ten minutes on the family tree.
Included in printable pack
Book club invite
Printable invite with the kit's heroic-versus-compromising question, a content note, and meeting details.
Included in printable pack
Character superlatives ballot
Vote Vianne vs Isabelle vs Julien vs Beck in categories that will start arguments, then tally out loud.
Included in printable pack
Review sheet
Likes/dislikes for pace, the Oregon frame, the ending's reveal, tears-to-comfort ratio, and which sister's courage convinced you. Room for a content-note check-in.
Included in printable pack