I have read the book but it was a long time ago. I in fact have a signed copy by Shaffers niece who completed the book. I meet her at an event on the island to celebrate the book. I have seen the movie much more recently and it’s tainted my memory.

I don’t dislike the book and it does have more to it than the movie. It’s just one of those things that if you brought it up with any group of people of here you’d get a range of feelings, but everyone would have something to say!

Overall I’m just glad that there are lots more people in the world that won’t give me blank stares when I say I’m from Guernsey. Now I get oh the potato book was from there!

I think you’ve inspired me to pick the book back up and have another read through.

As a person actually from Guernsey the book has an odd place here. It was written by an American author who got stuck at our airport one day and the only thing to hand to keep her entertained were books about the occupation in one of the shops.

The movie was filmed in England (because our government did agree to some terms to have it filmed here). The scenery is all wrong.

So it all feels a little off. We can be a little reserved about our history. Being occupied. Having children evacuated. To a lot of people, these don’t feel like things to be writing romance novels about.

We have loads of scars on our landscape and people from the occupation. Concrete German bunkers are visible everywhere. Our local language diminished significantly with the children having been evacuated that it is almost a dead language. There is a lot of sadness about the occupation.

But there is also remembrance here. Every year we celebrate liberation day on the island. We have cavalcades of Second World War uniforms and vehicles. Music from the era. And every local on the island has heard tales from their older relatives about what they got up to during the occupation.

sorry for the long reply. this book does that to most islanders. I once gave a tour to some friends of friends who loved the book and after the second stop it was too much for them. They wanted the happy ending not the grim reality.