France, 1992. Valérie Portheret is studying law and she’s researching the “Butcher of Lyon” Klaus Barbie and he was the head of the Gestapo in Vichy, France during WW II and he was an evil man. Her thesis is about him and it’s been five years since his trial for war crimes and she comes across an unexplained list of 108 children’s names.

Valérie investigates further and discovers the list contains the names of Jewish children saved from being transported in August 1942, they were smuggled out of Venissieux Interment Camp, given new names and some were taken in by sympathetic families and others lived in places Chateau de Peyrins. Valérie visits the Chateau and is given the hidden written records of the children who found safety behind the castle's walls.

Valérie has to painstakingly sort through the names and workout those who were French children boarders, others who were Jewish and given new identities, she wants to find each child, and if they remember who they really are and were any reunited with members of their families after the war ended?

At a time when the Holocaust and what happened was a touchy subject, many people didn’t want to talk about what occurred in France, they wanted to deny it happened and she had to overcome a lot of obstacles, resentment and opposition. It takes Valérie twenty five years to find out all of their names, what happened to them, she’s lucky to meet some of the survivors, member of the resistance and they dedicate a monument to the lost children and the brave people who saved them.

Valérie discovers the mothers of the children had one night to make a heartbreaking choice and teams of social workers, priests, members of the Red Cross and a psychiatrist, explained to them what they had to do, the children had to be secretly moved into a room in the camp without being noticed, kept quiet and smuggle out to a nearby orphanage and then relocated and without Klaus Barbie finding out and he went on a rampage afterwards.

I received a copy of The Forgotten Names by Mario Escobar from HarperCollins Focus and Edelweiss Plus in exchange for an unbiased review. Based on a real person Valérie Portheret, an ordinary woman who did the extraordinary. The mothers who made the hardest decision ever and showed ultimate love and selflessness. My favorite quote from the book "historians are humanitarians", five stars from me, another emotional and well written story by Mr. Escobar, I highly recommend The forgotten Names and his previous book, The Swiss Nurse.edelweiss-above-the-tree-line edelweiss-callenge-202441 s10 comments Christine1,022 30

The topic of the story was extremely interesting! However, I did not enjoy the way the novel was written. The structure of the storyline as well as the plot rather clumsy. The more modern time did not feel real even though the main character really existed! I would never have believed it if the author had not mentioned her at the end of the book. She did not feel convincing at all and I could not relate to her. The older timeline was much more interesting, but then again, the writing style felt clumsy. I do not know whether this is due to the translation or not. To me, this novel seemed more a draft than a finished work. The descriptions of the historical characters reminded me of journalistic reports which did not fit in a novel. I did read the whole book though as I was very interested in what happened to these children.
I received a digital copy of this novel from NetGalley and I am leaving voluntarily an honest review.10 s Toni Osborne1,476 46

When I see Mario Escobar has a new book available I simply have to get it, he never missed a beat and has always giving us historical facts mixed into a good story. Again he didn’t fail...

The story in a few words:

August 1942

French parents were faced with a horrible choice: watch their children die, or abandon them forever. To save them, Jewish mothers of Vénissieux were asked to make the ultimate sacrifice of abandoning them forever. The result of a coordinated effort by clergy, civilians, the French Resistance and members of other humanitarian organizations 108 children somehow managed to escape deportation and certain death in the German concentration camps.

Early 1990’s

Student Valérie Portheret in the midst of doing her doctoral research into the 108 children who disappeared from Vénissieux fifty years earlier made it her mission to match the abandoned names with the people they belong to. It took her a twenty-five year journey to allow the children to reclaim their heritage and remember their forgotten names.

My thoughts:

Told in dual timelines this account of true events is both sad and captivating. It is very well-said to keep our interest at its peak and us pushing on. It is chilling story that places us in the zone where Klaus Barbie was the German commander who ruled Lyon, France with an iron fist and did not hesitated to torture anyone. We do have graphic scenes to make the point. Of course this story is not fun to read, seeing the Jewish population hunted and shipped to concentration and children taken from their parents in order to save them is heartbreaking.

Although the conversation is fictionalized and the timeline may be out of sync, the characters are real and the events well documented. The timeline for those who hate this, the back and forth is on occasion and I felt it did not interfered with the flow. The chapters are short and the narration active. “The Forgotten Names” is well-said and well-done.

I received this Arc from Harper Muse via Netgalley for my thoughts: this is the way I see it.best-book-read-in-june6 s2 comments Caroline PalmerAuthor 1 book24

The triumphant story of the French men and women who did everything they could against incredible odds to save the lives of Jewish children from the Nazi Extermination camps.6 s Stephanie Fitzgerald876

The first half of this book read almost a textbook, with many names, dates, and facts to keep straight . The parts about the actual rescue of the children were more interesting, so I gave it three stars.
I’m guessing that the strange, very difficult to read formatting was due to the book being an Advanced Reader Digital Copy. It really slowed down my progress in reading, and made it less enjoyable as well.
*I received a free digital copy in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are strictly my own.*reviewed-on-goodreads4 s Phoebe82

Rating- 3 Stars
(E-ARC)
I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. Many thanks to NetGalley, the author and Harper Muse for letting me have a early copy of this book and for letting me give my honest review of this book.

The Forgotten Names is a World War 2 historical fiction book that has been inspired by true events where in August 1942, French parents were faced to either watch their children die or to give them their parental rights to let these children have a chance at life. 108 children managed to escape deportation and death from the German concentration camps. It shows the results of a number of individuals such as clergy, civilians and humanitarian organisations and the French Resistance who risked their lives to save these children. This book shows what these individuals did to save these children where their lives were often on the line. Furthermore, this book also focuses on a law student called Valeire Portheret who looks into these children for her thesis five years after the trial of Klaus Barbie. Valerie strived to help find these children to reclaim their heritage and remember their forgotten names.

When I first started this book, I had no idea about this in World War 2 and was super interested to learn what happened to these children. It is always things this that are left out of history and are something everyone should know. This book was really hard to put down as you really want to find out what happened to the children. This book really brought some many emotions especially the things that the children and adults did to escape from the work camp. The way the Red Cross allowed this to happen made me so mad but at the same time the French Resistance were only able to do so much themselves.

Unfornately despite it being an interesting topic for the story, it did fall flat for me. The short chapters really kept you engaged but there were so many characters that it was really hard to keep up with. It would have been helpful if the author had labelled who's point of view it was instead of including multiple ones. Multiple times, there were a lot of children being introduced in one chapter. I feel if a few of the children were focused on it would have made it less confusing. The short chapters also meant that you were not able to connect with the characters. As a result, it felt quite choppy and abrupt because as soon as you finished one point of view you were quickly whisked to another after three pages. In some cases, personally I did not feel that some of the points of views were needed.

Some of the characters did not feel as important and were only mentioned maybe once or twice in the book. Despite them not being important, the author included a lot of history about characters which really felt journalistic. It felt it was a history lesson. It could have been a lot less and made it flow a lot better. This was especially the case for the ones who helped the children. Despite Valerie helping to locate these children, she is only seen in the book a handful of times to do some research and seminars. I really felt you do not get to know this character at all despite being the main character. This made the ending super disappointing and out of the many characters introduced you only knew what happened to a few of them.netgalley4 s Linda Galella666 64

I received a copy for review purposes; all opinions are honest and mine alone.


In the midst of researching Klaus Barbie for her thesis, law student, Valerie Portheret, discovers a list of 108 children that were smuggled away from the Nazi’s by a tiny group of very determined resistance workers in Lyon, France. After convincing her professor that THIS is where she needs to focus her research efforts, Valerie spends 25 years uncovering the details, locating the children, now in their 70’s, and remembering THE FORGOTTEN NAMES.

Altho’ this book is classified as historical fiction, the fictional aspect is minimal, IMO. Author, Mario Escobar, adds dialogue between characters and rearranges events, (within a very reasonable timeline), in order to make the historical facts more interesting and readable.

A few other reviewers have not enjoyed the format for this book but I found it added to the veracity. Can you imagine what it would be to find a list of 108 names that was 50 years old and with almost nothing to go on, try to locate the people? The world is a big place, 50 years is a literal lifetime and names get changed. For these children, names were changed on purpose and later on, marriage for women, new countries for others and on and on. As the research happens, the contemporary timeline pops into the book with updates as to Valerie’s progress. In the past timeline, events occur chronologically. Both timelines are written in short chapters. The translation is flawless.

Escobar is able to tell a story about horrific events without resorting to gratuitous and graphic language. It’s one of the elements I most admire about his writing. Given the current events in our world today, THE FORGOTTEN NAMES is a book that should be read by many
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