The Winemaker's Wife

By: Kristin Harmel

Narrated by: Robin Eller, Lisa Flanagan, Madeleine Maby

“Love and betrayal, forgiveness and redemption combine in a heady tale of the ever present past” (Pam Jenoff, New York Times bestselling author) set amid the champagne vineyards of northern France during the darkest days of World War II. Perfect for fans of Kristin Hannah’s The Nightingale and Julia Kelly’s The Light Over London.

Champagne, 1940: Inès has just married Michel, the owner of storied champagne house Maison Chauveau, when the Germans invade. As the danger mounts, Michel turns his back on his marriage to begin hiding munitions for the Résistance. Inès fears they’ll be exposed, but for Céline, half-Jewish wife of Chauveau’s chef de cave, the risk is even greater—rumors abound of Jews being shipped east to an unspeakable fate.

When Céline recklessly follows her heart in a desperate bid for happiness, and Inès makes a dangerous mistake with a Nazi collaborator, they risk the lives of those they love—and the champagne house that ties them together.

New York, 2019: Liv Kent has just lost everything when her eccentric French grandmother shows up unannounced, insisting on a trip to France. But the older woman has an ulterior motive—and a tragic, decades-old story to share. When past and present finally collide, Liv finds herself on a road to salvation that leads right to the caves of the Maison Chauveau.

A spellbinding and exceptional tale of love, courage, and betrayal, “once you start reading this moving novel, you will not be able to put it down until you reach the last page” (Armando Lucas Correa, author of The German Girl).

Believably flawed heroes

I really enjoyed this book! Historical fiction, especially WWII era Europe woven with stories of heroism and love, seem to be all the rage these days. I love them but they can be a bit monotonous.
so many stories of regular people, usually innocent or misunderstood women, who find bravery they never knew they had to heroically navigate the great oppression and tyranny that engulfed the world in the years of the war. These stories are often told from many perspectives in two different times with the human flaws of the heroes filterd away with the rose colored glasses many authors think we need to really love the character.
The heros of those books are who we want to think we'd be. This book has all of the things that we love to see in modern historical fiction, except the flawless heroes. The heroes of this book are human. They make choices we all think we'd never make, but really we know we could, and in truth, probably would, under the given circumstances, and without the benefit of hindsight showing us the big picture.
The characters here are fallible, relatable, human. They make terrible mistakes. They aren't near infallible. The story is a story that suggests that even great people do bad things sometimes. sometimes for the right reson sometime not. and at the end of the day they can grow to atone for them: and find forgiveness for them and evolve into the people many of us would like to be.

Twists and Turns

The Winemaker’s Wife offers a perspective during WW II from the vineyards of France. So many books about WW II have been published, but this one is unique, coming from a very human account of how people choose to live their life when they fear the end could be near.
The characters are realistic and relatable, making the reader feel their emotions. The ending gave me chills, I wasn’t expecting it at all!
My only complaint is the voice of Julian sounded very very old, yet he is one of the younger characters in the book. I’m sure it’s hard for one narrator to change voices for about 5 or 6 characters, so it is a very very slight complaint. The narrator’s style made it easy to discern between each character, the voices were easily recognizable.
Definitely recommend reading or listening, especially if you like historical settings with a twist and a little romance. The Winemaker’s Wife has it all!

What a great book!

I loved the story from start to finish. Everything about the story kept me interested. I did not, however, love the story teller. Her accent was so bad that there were times I just wanted to pick up the paperback instead of listening to her try to make the accents sound good. But, I made it through while driving and loved the story.

loved it

easy to listen to. well written contains a good story worth every word .treat yourself

Poor narration

Good story. Unfortunate choice of narration. It was especially painful to listen to the French dialect.