After D-Day, her photograph appears on the most-wanted Nazi propaganda posters. Who is the girl with the red beret? She reminds Lenny of Natasha, but no, that cannot be. Why does Rochelle step into the courtroom when he is lead by SS soldiers to the gallows? At the risk of being found out as a French Resistance fighter, what makes her propose marriage to a condemned man?
Marriage before Death: WWII Spy Thriller (Still Life with Memories, #5)
By uvipoznansky
I would follow Uvi Poznansky anywhere, and, joy! Now she’s written a World War II thriller intertwined with an unusual, powerful love story. Marriage Before Death is the fifth in the author’s Still Life with Memories series about Lenny and Natasha Kaminsky, war heroes. I’ve loved every one.
Lenny, in the present, is remembering the couple’s terrifying time in France, in 1944 in the long weeks before D-Day. Lenny’s pain is that Natasha now is suffering from Alzheimer’s. He tries to get her to remember when they were separated for a time: he was caught out of uniform and facing execution by the Germans; Natasha had disappeared into the French Resistance to help both the Resistance and the Allies. The story of how they survived such horrors is extraordinary. Also extraordinary is the author’s deep and gorgeous writing, interweaving desperation with descriptions of “beautiful light streaming from high-arched, stained glass windows, rattling in the duel between the German artillery and ours.”
These are the memories that Lenny aches to remember with Natasha, as her disease intensifies and she struggles against it. In so many ways, our inner wars are so much more painful than any “outer” war, and this is the core of what readers feel as this story unfolds.
I truly loved this story and recommend it – and the whole Still Life with Memories series. Five stars!
Uvi always knows how to spin a tail that brings you to that time and place and those people. Fantastic story told with insight and imagination. Highly recommend any of Uvi’s books!
This is quite simply a great book. I felt like I was there at one of the most important times in our history. The author is an extremely talented storyteller. I highly recommend it!
An achingly sweet love between a man and a woman, danger and desperation set amid a ghastly war, beautiful, poignant, powerful—all of these describe Marriage Before Death. I was touched by Lenny’s deep affection for Natasha, shocked by the horrors of war, mesmerized by the author’s alluring descriptions of 1944 France. This story is both bold and riveting. Although Marriage Before Death stands on its own, I recommend reading books 1-4 of the series in order to get the most from this fascinating novel.
Although this is part of the Still Life With Memories Series, I read it as a stand alone and was able to go back and read the rest of the series. I became obsessed with Lenny and Natasha as these two return to memories of their past during World War II. Even with Lennie’s help, Natasha has trouble recalling the terrifying time in France when she’d disappeared to help both the Resistance and the Allies. A captivating story of an ageless love faced in the present with the ravages of Alzheimer’s disease. Excellent.
Uvi Poznansky writes gorgeous prose, and this book is no exception; every word is carefully chosen to create a picture – it’s no surprise that she’s also a visual artist!
This story unfolds both in the present, as Lenny tries to help his wife Natasha, suffering from Alzheimers; and also in World War II, as we see the story of how they fought the Nazis in France in the days leading up to D-Day.
It’s a beautiful book, and highly recommended (as are all of Uvi’s works!)
‘Marriage before Death’ by Uvi Poznansky is an outstanding tale that, whilst sad and tragic, contains the kernel of a hopeful outcome. The author cleverly places the readers in an extremely emotional moment in the life of the protagonists, just when all seems to take an irrevocable turn for the worse. Then she whisks us off to an earlier time, during World War II, where we can read about the extraordinary circumstances that cemented this special relationship. Although this book is part of a series, it stands up as a story that can be read even if, like me, you have not read any of the previous novels.
The tale at the center of this story details an episode set in France during the war. It is a character-driven plot, related with intrigue and in a fast-paced style that will have readers turning pages as they are drawn into the events. The author not only creates some very convincing characters that carry her story forward, but also manages to imbue the pages with historic details and vivid description that easily place the reader in the scenes.
A wonderful tale from a superb author. Highly recommended.
The book starts in “present time,” which appears to be around 1980. Lenny is “middle-aged.” Lenny and Natasha have been married for 35 years. Natasha, sadly, is suffering from Alzheimer’s and Lenny is struggling with his grief over her condition by trying to write down the story of their early lives together. Marriage Before Death is the fifth book in the series, and recounts Lenny and Natasha’s adventures as intelligence agents during World War II.
Lenny and Natasha are thrown together in war-torn France, where Lenny has been part of the D-Day invasion and Natasha has been there for a month, having parachuted in to be a liaison with the Resistance.
The fact that Natasha, in the present, is frail and fading and will presumably soon be dead, gives the book a haunting, resonant quality, an air of tragic inevitability. In a way, it’s a very old style of story- telling. Years ago, when I would read Beowulf or Gilgamesh or The Song of Roland in college English classes, I found them all very sad, because the main character dies in the end, but these were not considered sad stories at the time they were written. The modern world sees death in the movies or on TV but we rarely see it in our own lives. ‘Happily ever after’ is the modern sensibility. Our stories most often end at the marriage, or the birth, or the victory, but to the ancients, a story was not complete until the end, and the end was the death. Beowulf and Roland died triumphantly, their lives complete. These were not sad stories. They were inspiring and uplifting stories.
This series, Still Life With Memories, tries to offer the same sort of completion, of telling a story until the actual end, and the fact that the end is already known imbues what comes before with extra significance. It’s a well told tale, with excellent characterizations and a plot that moves briskly along. Recommended.
Reads As A Stand-Alone In A Series Of Stories About Lenny And Natasha. The Flashback To D-Day With A Backdrop Of Romance Is A Fascinating Look Back At World War II. Fans Of The Notebook May Enjoy This Book.
This is the fifth book in the Still Life with Memories series, a five book series with a sixth brief book bite. Each book reads well as a stand-alone, offering a snippet into Lenny’s life. Fans of The Notebook may enjoy this book, as some aspects are reminiscent of that story.
This is the story of Lenny and Natasha. It opens and closes in roughly 1979, when they are celebrating their thirty-fifth wedding anniversary. Based on information in other books, Lenny is fifty-six and Natasha is fifty-four. Lenny has become the caretaker of Natasha, whose memory has been slipping for some time and she had eventually been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. She has few lucid moments, and it weighs heavily on Lenny.
The bulk of the book is a flashback to a time before Lenny and Natasha marry. As revealed in Dancing with Air, book four, Lenny had been forced to keep secrets from her when he served as a Marine in London during World War II. Natasha, a concert pianist, had joined the USO to be near Lenny in war-torn London. Though it had been part of a covert mission, the secrets had caused a complication in their relationship. She finally left London, on good terms, to hazard an attempt at a transatlantic voyage home to New York. But as Lenny learned a few months later, Natasha had some secrets of her own. She had promised him to share some of the missing pieces of her story after the war, and the likelihood of that ever happening is slipping away. He cannot help but attempt once again to trigger her memory.
Lenny recalls the events of June 6, 1944 when he stormed the beaches of Normandy, France with the allied forces on D-Day. It was just a few months since Natasha had left London, and she was always on his mind. Survival on that day was only the beginning of the danger he would face. But soon he had not only himself to worry about, as the picture of a most-wanted French Resistance fighter known as Rochelle is plastered everywhere, and she happens to look very much like Lenny’s own Natasha.
For this book, there appear to be some inconsistencies with times and dates across the series, which are a bit of a chore to piece together and may cause some readers to pause. *Spoilers* It would make more sense if this story took place during an earlier wedding anniversary for Lenny and Natasha. Nevertheless, there is nothing that anchors this story to this particular time, so it is easy to look past that. For those attempting to follow, I have reconstructed dates in the series below. Some are specifically stated, others are calculated based upon new information. This excludes any info given in The White Piano.
• Natasha: born 1925.
• Lenny: born 1923.
• They meet in 1941 (she is 16, he is 18).
• They marry: 1945 (he is 22, she is 20).
• They have Ben five years later in 1950 (he is 27, she is 25).
• Natasha shows her first symptoms in 1964 (she is 39, Lenny is 41, Ben is 14).
• Natasha divorces Lenny after learning of his single indiscretion in 1967 (she is 42).
• Ben drops out of high school and leaves home to travel abroad in 1967 (he is 17).
• *The Music of Us* takes place in 1970 and the couple is together (Natasha is 45; Lenny 47).
• Natasha is diagnosed in 1971 (she is 46).
• *Dancing with Air* takes place sometime after 1970 and the couple is together.
• **Natasha probably goes to live at Sunrise Assisted Living in 1972 (when she is 47), five years after Lenny’s indiscretion and the divorce. That means that Dancing with Air and Marriage before Death should take place by this time, since Natasha lives at home in those books.
• *My Own Voice* should take place in 1977, when Ben is 27 and Anita is 26 or 27 (Lenny is 54).
• **Marriage before Death** takes place in 1980 and the couple is together (35th wedding anniversary; Natasha is 55, Lenny is 57). This makes Ben 30, which doesn’t match up with the story since he returned home at twenty-seven and here his is still overseas. It makes more sense for this story to take place in 1972 just before Natasha goes into assisted living and the couple’s 27th anniversary.
The D-Day story with a backdrop of romance is a fascinating look back at World War II. It is well-written. The story takes the reader back in time; the details feel authentic and immerse the reader in a tumultuous time in France, where allegiances were in doubt and different forces could be happened upon around any corner. The plot is somewhat complex. The characters are unique and authentic. The story is written in first person in Lenny’s POV. I rate the book four stars.
WW II novel. Romance, more than romance… A couple, Lenny and Natasha, fighting in the war. Danger, more than danger…their lives are on the edge. How they survive to grow old together…..
Uvi Poznansky writes with such feeling and clarity, you feel you are there. So, so good. Warning: Pick up one of her books and you’ll be reading them all!
I listened to Audible version and Don Warrick is Lenny to me. He is an excellent story teller.
I voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book from Story Origin.
So, I’ll be honest and tell you I have not read the first 4 books in this series, but I will soon. I was absolutely enthralled with the beautiful writing in this book. It is so vividly worded that I found myself thinking this would make an excellent movie!
This is a love story wrapped in a thriller and I was turning pages long into the night to see what happened next. I won’t spoil the plot for you, but I will tell you this story takes place through flashbacks that are hindered by Alzheimer’s—a disease that has touched my own family. One of the major characters, Natasha, struggles with the disease as the story unfolds and the author makes it so real that I often found myself nodding and fighting back tears.
Do yourself a favor and get this book. I feel like maybe the story would be EVEN RICHER with a reading of the other 4, so … I’ll be downloading those as well.
What an intense storyline. This is a powerful story of wartime, love, betrayal, sacrifice and most of all survival in the worst of times. Great book that I would recommend to everyone
Great book!
Marriage Before Death, by Uvi Poznansky, is a marvelously written story of two individuals and their trials during WWII. Filled with drama, romance, and Ms. Poznansky’s incredible writing style, you have nothing short of a magnificent five-star novel. Since this is my first experience with this author, I have not read the first four books in the series, but will make time to do so.
The story is told as a series of flashbacks between husband and wife recalling their experiences during the war. Natasha, as a member of the French Resistance, and Lenny a soldier in Post-D-Day France. The poignant aspect of the novel is that Natasha is showing signs of Alzheimer’s and her memories of her experiences are fading. Having myself cared for a mother from the Greatest Generation with this indiscriminate disease, I understood and felt Lenny’s pain.
A highly recommended book by a fantastic writer. Will I be reading more of Ms. Poznansky’s work? You bet.