Renee Ryan is the author of thirty novels and counting. She sold her first book in 2001 by winning the inaugural Dorchester/Romantic Times New Historical Voice Contest. She published her second book with Harlequin’s Love Inspired Historical and has since sold books to other Harlequin imprints and to Amazon’s Waterfall Press.
Q: Is this novel a prequel or a sequel to The Widows of Champagne and The Paris Housekeeper?
Renee Ryan: This story takes place during the time Paulette’s mother is sent away. I don’t consider it a prequel or a sequel but rather a book that fills in the blanks of both previous stories. I would describe them as parallel stories with some new characters. Paulette needed redemption and her own story because, in The Widows of Champagne, she was left in such a bad place. She was seen as spoiled and entitled, a child who hadn’t grown up. At the end of that book, she was furious and angry, and I wondered what happened to her in Paris. In The Paris Housekeeper, Vivian, one of the main characters, became a shadow figure. In some ways, she was the villain, yet at the same time, she was an anti-hero. Readers wanted to understand her motives better.
Q: How would you describe Paulette in this book?
Renee: She is restless, frustrated, remorseful, ashamed, angry, guilty, lonely, isolated, vulnerable, and deeply broken at the beginning of the story. But she becomes motivated as she realizes her life must mean more. She believes she has betrayed her mother—the only person who truly believed in her. She is not the typical WWII heroine because she is very privileged.
Q: How would you describe Nicolle, the new character in the story?
Renee: She is smart, resourceful, brave, a risk-taker, efficient, a survivalist, loyal, strong, and forced to live in the shadows as a Jew. She starts as a mentor to Paulette, then becomes a friend, and finally, a sister-like figure. They share a deep connection through loneliness and grief.
Q: What about Sabine?
Renee: She is compassionate, responsible, strong, confident, kind, determined, and a protector. She serves as a mother figure to Paulette but sees herself as the proud mother of Nicolle.
Q: What role does Paulette’s mother’s disappearance play in the story?
Renee: Paulette spends this entire story trying to redeem herself because she had a relationship with a German SS officer. She thought she could change him. She believed everything would work out because her mother had always made things right for her. But this time, the one person who had always saved her was also the one person she betrayed. The guilt, regret, and self-loathing she feels because of her mother’s fate drive her actions.
Q: What did you mean by the powerful quote about Jews in Paris during WWII?
Renee: You’re referring to this quote: “A chance at a happy future, in a place where being Jewish is not a death sentence?” I wanted to show how many Parisians betrayed their Jewish neighbors, friends, and fellow countrymen. I explored this in The Paris Housekeeper as well. The resistance was fragmented into small, unorganized groups, and Jewish people couldn’t even share their heritage with their non-Jewish best friends. The Nazi roundups started with immigrants but soon expanded to all Jews, orchestrated by the French police. Paris was supposed to be the City of Light, a place of beauty and art, but as genocide unfolded, the lights went out.
Q: What about the collaborators?
Renee: I wanted to show that black marketers lived large off their fellow citizens’ distress. For them, it wasn’t about ideology but self-comfort. One of my antagonists was based on Pierre Bonny.
Q: How would you describe Nicolle’s friend, Andre?
Renee: He is quiet, loyal, intense, serious, resolute, and calm. He is heroic, brave, and courageous. He and Nicolle formed a deep connection through their shared loss and grief. She trusted him from the beginning, and he saw her as a person, a protector, a friend, and an equal.
Q: What about Philippe, a man Paulette depended on?
Renee: He is hard, ruthless, angry, condescending, yet also caring, heroic, and grieving. He was part of the resistance and driven by the need to avenge his late wife’s death.
Q: What’s next for you?
Renee: I have a few ideas I’m considering. I want to write about female relationships and how they form a community.
The Last Fashion House in Paris, by Renee Ryan, is a companion novel to both The Widows of Champagne and The Paris Housekeeper. This story is more historical suspense than romance and the relationship in this book between the lovers takes a backseat to the platonic relationship between the women. It is about women community where the characters are mentors, friends, sisters, and mothers. They show strength, tenacity, solidarity and resilience in WWII Nazi occupied Paris.
Paulette is from a wealthy, respected family that owns a renowned vineyard and winery. She had fallen in love with a German SS soldier and mistakenly believed he could help her Jewish mother to safety. But he betrayed her, and her mother was taken away. Her older sister, Gabrielle, sends her off to Maison de Ballard, a highly regarded fashion house in Paris because the family feels Paulette is responsible for her mother’s disappearance. It is run by a very good friend of her mother, Mademoiselle Sabine, who is deeply involved with the French resistance against the Nazi occupation. Sabine befriends Nicolle, a young war widow, and trains her for the resistance. Soon Paulette is recruited as a spy. Working as a seamstress by day, gathering information at glamorous parties by night, Paulette at last has a chance to earn the redemption she craves. The three women risk their lives as they work together to help downed pilots escape and transport Jewish families to safety.
This is a wonderful story of redemption, forgiveness, adventure, and sisterhood. To fulfil their missions, all three women find themselves taking greater and greater chances. The plot is engaging and intriguing, showing Ryan is at the top of her game.
