TTT: Favorite books set in a historical time

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Top Ten Tuesday: Favorite books set in Europe and the Pacific during World War II.

I have read a lot of books about World War Two over the years. Here are a few of my favorites, listed in random order, after Night by Elie Wiesel and The Diary of Anne Frank, which everyone knows and has read:

1. The Hiding Place by Corrie ten Boom
A nonfiction account about two sisters arrested in the Netherlands for hiding and sheltering Jews. Half of the book is about their experiences saving Jewish individuals from sure annihilation. The second half is about their experiences living in a concentration camp. Corrie ten Boom survived and used her story as a positive Christian message of hope and forgiveness. I read this book years ago and it has stayed with me all these years.

2. Schindler's List by Thomas Keneally
Yes, everyone has seen the movie but I recommend everyone also read the book. It is a fiction book about a real man, Oscar Schindler and how he personally saved thousands of Jews by creating a list and making sure the people on that list were not touched by the Nazis. This book blew me away.

3. All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
Two intertwined stories, one in France, the other in Germany before and during WWII. This was my favorite novel of 2015.

4. The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak
This story about a young foster child living with a German family during the lean years of the war. She learns to read and hordes books. She also helps her foster parents save a Jewish man by hiding him. This book ranks in my top ten YA novels.

5. A Town Like Alice by Nevil Shute
Set in Pacific during WWII and then Australia afterwards. The first part of the book covers the story of British woman and children who become prisoners of war when Japan captured the island where they lived. They were then forced to march all over Malaya before settling down in a village to wait out the end of the war. I loved the mini-series and have read and re-read the book many times.

6. Unbroken: a World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand.
The amazing, AMAZING story of Louis Zamperini, a US Olympian, whose plane went down over the Pacific. He survived months in the life raft just to be captured by the Japanese. This reads like an adventure novel but it is all true.

7. In Harm's Way: The Sinking of the U.S.S. Indianapolis and the Extraordinary Story of Its Survivors by Doug Stanton. Another true account. This one about the last ship sunk at the end of the war. Because the war was nearly over, no one was looking for the ship not did they send out a rescue team to save the sailors floating in the ocean. This book made me mad, but it is very well-written.

8. The City of Thieves by David Benioff
Set in Leningrad during the 900 days of siege on the city by the Nazis. This book has humor, but at the same time a lot of heart. Another two favorites on this topic: Symphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri Shostkovich and the Siege on Leningrad by M.T. Anderson AND The Madonnas of Leningrad by Debra Dean about the artwork in the Hermitage Museum and how it and the people who worked there survived the terrible war.

9. Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys
Lithuania during WWII under Stalin where he did worse things to his own people than even imaginable. This story is based on the story of what happened to the author's family.

10. Sarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay
Oh my. What a book. It revealed the deplorable acts of the French people against the Jew in the Vel' d'Hiv arena. Very sad.

11. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Shaffer and Barrows.
WWII in Guernsey island. Written as a series of letters. I enjoyed this book a lot.

There are so many more. I will stop.