The Secret Society of Librarians

Set across London and Poland in the 1940s, the novel connects a real-life society of librarians with a fictional wartime story of two women. As the conflict disrupts their lives, their libraries move underground, linking the book’s focus on reading and community to the danger and separation of the period. Its dual narrative also follows the consequences of one woman’s deportation to a concentration camp and the friends’ hope of reunion. The historical setting and researched inspiration place an intimate bond at the center of a story shaped by the wider upheaval of World War II.