A Q&A WITH SARAH BOURNE

What first inspired you to tell Miriam's story?

I was walking my dogs in our local park and fell into conversation with another dog-owner. She was about to go to her father’s 100th birthday celebrations. He’d been in a camp in WW2 and she made the comment that the experience had changed him forever (how could it not?), and that in many ways, the war hadn’t ended for him. That made me think that although victory was declared in 1945, life didn’t go back to normal immediately, if at all, and thousands of people had been psychologically as well as physically traumatised. Who knew what they might do?

Enter, Miriam and Pierre, different people in the resistance in different parts of France who lost everything. How might they feel, what might they do?

What kind of research did you do to bring occupied Paris and the Resistance to life?

I watched as many YouTube videos as I could find on people who’d actually been in the resistance, read dozens of books, and spent a lot of time imagining myself in Occupied France and wondering if I’d have been brave enough to join the resistance. What would it have been like to know that at any moment, you could be picked up and tortured, sent to a camp or gunned down in the street. I had quite a few sleepless nights over that.

And what was the most interesting thing you came across?

I think how quickly and completely the Germans took over Paris, making it into a German city almost overnight. They posted new rules and regulations daily, forcing the Parisians to submit to German rule.

What was the most challenging part of writing this book?

Initially, I thought the toughest task would be to make sure that when Miriam sought revenge, the reader would empathise with her and not write her off as a monster (some still might). But the scene that I kept shying away from was the torture. In the end I decided to keep it short and let the reader imagine the rest.

What did a typical writing day look like while working on this book?

I actually started writing this book six years ago and got to about 30,000 words and got stuck. I had an idea for another book and turned to that one instead. When I finally returned to The Paris Resistance, I realised I’d started it in completely the wrong place, and once I’d realise that it became easier, but I still wrote in fits and starts, using more research as a way of procrastinating!

What do you hope readers take away from The Paris Resistance once they turn the final page?

I hope the reader will have engaged with Miriam and Pierre’s journeys and understand what drove them to do what they did.

What are some of your go-to historical fiction recommendations?

Fiction set in WW2, I enjoyed The Silence Before Dawn and Paris at First Light by Amanda Lees, Sarah’s Key by Tatiana de Rosnay, and Charlotte Grey by Sebastian Faulks, but at the moment, I’m reading a lot of novels set in Victorian London (I’m hatching a plot for a new book set in 1868 and calling it research!