33 Place Brugmann
In Alice Austen’s engrossing historical novel 33 Place Brugmann, World War II disrupts a close-knit group living in a Brussels apartment building.
In August of 1939, the residents of 33 Place Brugmann are aware of Adolf Hitler’s encroaching domination. For Leo and Sophia and their children, the threat is deadly; faced with the prospect of concentration camps and potential extermination, the Jewish family leaves Belgium. Leo makes shrewd plans to keep his impressive art collection from being confiscated by the Nazis; their son, Julian, joins the Royal Air Force, and their daughter, Esther, becomes a nurse caring for wounded soldiers.
Charlotte, an art student, lives with her father, an architect, in the building. Upon learning that the family left, she feels shock and dismay, deepened by her romantic attraction to Julian. Charlotte’s father, Francois, is still troubled by the trauma he experienced during World War I, including being gassed in the trenches. He is also mystified and disgusted by Hitler’s rise to power.
The perspective alternates between Leo and Sophia’s family, Charlotte and Francois, and various other tenants—faceted viewpoints from within and beyond the apartment house. With a sense of increasing urgency, each character’s need to make decisions and take action within a compressed time frame is made clear. The building itself is also distinctive, from its initial multistoried presence filled with bustling residents and clanking radiators to its later role as a place of secret defiance against the Nazis. While some tenants show surprising valor, others are affected by prolonged food rationing or concerns for self-preservation. Meanwhile, Jews like Julian and Esther contemplate having “nose jobs” or bobbing their long, dark, wavy hair to be less ethnically identifiable.
With eloquent and tense wartime suspense, the novel 33 Place Brugmann is an intricate character study about individuality and communal connection.
Reviewed by
Meg Nola
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