The French Kitchen

In this energetic historical, Cambron (The Italian Ballerina) whisks readers along on a woman’s harrowing quest to track down her soldier brother in WWII France. It’s 1943, and Kat Harris is content repairing cars in her late father’s auto shop when her brother Gavin enlists in the army. After months go by with no word from Gavin, Kat receives a mysterious letter inviting her to join the same “subversive operation,” headed by the U.S. Office of Strategic Services, that he was supposedly a part of. Kat joins the mission, which brings her to France, where she poses as a chef at a chateau frequented by powerful Nazis. By war’s end, she still hasn’t reconnected with her brother, but she retains an uncanny faith that he’s still alive—and when she meets Julia Child in a French cooking class after the war, new clues emerge that might help her unravel the mystery. Kat’s multiple code names can be difficult to keep straight, but Cambron paints a textured portrait of wartime France, balancing action-packed scenes with entertaining appearances from Julia Child and mouthwatering descriptions of French cuisine. The author’s fans are sure to savor this. (Aug.)