The Paris Library

Janet Skeslien Charles

Paris, 1939: Young and ambitious Odile Souchet has it all: her handsome police officer beau and a dream job at the American Library in Paris. When the Nazis march into Paris, Odile stands to lose everything she holds dear, including her beloved library. Together with her fellow librarians, Odile joins the Resistance with the best weapons she has: books. But when the war finally ends, instead of freedom, Odile tastes the bitter sting of unspeakable betrayal.



Montana, 1983: Lily is a lonely teenager looking for adventure in small-town Montana. Her interest is piqued by her solitary, elderly neighbor. As Lily uncovers more about her neighbor's mysterious past, she finds that they share a love of language, the same longings, and the same intense jealousy, never suspecting that a dark secret from the past connects them.



A powerful novel that explores the consequences of our choices and the relationships that make us who we are 'family, friends, and favorite authors' The Paris Library shows that extraordinary heroism can sometimes be found in the quietest of places.


Adult Book Club Kits

  • Useful Delusions: The Power and Pardox of the Self-Deceiving Brain


  • The Neighbor's Secret


  • Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption


  • Little Fires Everywhere


  • The Ku Klux Klan in the Heartland


  • Educated


  • Red, White & Royal Blue


  • The Underground Railroad


  • Where the Crawdads Sing


  • Caste : the Origins of Our Discontents


  • Stories of Elders


  • Red at the Bone


  • The Night Watchman


  • Bento Box in the Heartland


  • Transcendent Kingdom


  • Dead Letters from Paradise


  • Another Brooklyn


  • Faithful


  • Demon Copperhead


  • The Thursday Murder Club


  • Making It All Right: a Novel


  • Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine


  • Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants


  • Crying in H Mart: A Memoir


  • Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twinty-First Century


  • The Night Tiger


  • A Gentleman in Moscow


  • The Paris Library


  • Before We Were Yours


  • Voracious


  • How to Be Nice to Yourself


  • Small Marvels: Stories