The Ventriloquists

June 10, 2019
Ramzipoor’s magnetic debut, based on the true story of an intricate WWII propaganda scheme, takes place in the fall of 1943 in Nazi-occupied Belgium. Anticipating an Allied invasion, Gruppenführer August Wolff, head of Germany’s new Ministry of Perception Management, plans an ambitious campaign to circulate information that’s alleged to come from the Resistance but is really the product of his office. He rounds up four members of the underground group the Front de l’Indépendance and orders them to publish an issue of its newspaper, La Libre Belgique, that looks and reads like other copies but portrays the Allies in an unflattering light. The leader of the quartet, Marc Aubrion, knows they will be executed at the end of the project, so he convinces them to die for the cause: they will secretly and concurrently create a black propaganda version of the collaborationist paper Le Soir, to poke fun at the Nazis and give Belgians a much-needed psychological boost. To assist his team—prostitute Lada Tarcovich, editor Theo Mullier, and professor Martin Victor—Aubrion recruits a local teenager called Gamin, an expert at newspaper distribution and arson. Over 18 jam-packed days that end with a big bang, the lives of all the members of the group will be changed. Sprawling and ambitious, with crisp pacing and fully realized characters, this will fascinate anyone looking for an unusual, enthralling war story.

June 15, 2019
Based on an actual incident in Nazi-occupied Belgium, Ramzipoor's debut is a tragicomic account of fake news for a cause. Structured like a heist movie, the novel follows several members of a conspiracy in Enghien, Belgium, who have a daring plan. The conspirators do not intend to survive this caper, only to bring some humor--and encouragement for resisters--into the grim existence of Belgians under Nazi rule. To this end, the plotters--among them Marc Aubrion, a journalist and comic; David Spiegelman, an expert forger; Lada Tarcovich, a smuggler and sex worker; and Gamin, a girl masquerading as a male street urchin--intend to...publish a newspaper. And only one issue of a newspaper, to be substituted on one night for the regular evening paper, Le Soir, which has become a mouthpiece for Nazi disinformation. Le Faux Soir, as the changeling paper is appropriately dubbed, will feature satire, doctored photographs making fun of Hitler, and wry requests for a long-overdue Allied invasion. (Target press date: Nov. 11, 1943.) To avoid immediate capture, the Faux Soir staff must act as double agents, convincing (or maybe not) the local Nazi commandant, August Wolff, that they are actually putting out an anti-Allies "propaganda bomb." The challenge of fleshing out and differentiating so many colorful characters, combined with the sheer logistics of acquiring paper, ink, money, facilities, etc. under the Gestapo's nose, makes for an excruciatingly slow exposé of how this sausage will be made. The banter here, reminiscent of the better Ocean's Eleven sequels, keeps the mechanism well oiled, but it is still creaky. A few scenes amply illustrate the brutality of the Occupation, and sexual orientation works its way in: Lada is a lesbian and David, in addition to being a Jew, is gay--August Wolff's closeted desire may be the only reason David has, so far, escaped the camps. The genuine pathos at the end of this overdetermined rainbow may be worth the wait. A little-known story that will have special resonance for today's resisters.

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Starred review from May 1, 2019
When the Belgian newspaper Le Soir was co-opted by the Nazis during WWII and turned into a propaganda-spewing daily, it didn't sit well with members of the Front de l'Ind�pendance, especially maverick journalist and prankster Marc Aubrion, who, together with several of his fellow Resistance members, published a parody edition, Faux Soir, in 1943, which mocked Hitler and the Nazis. From these historical facts, debut novelist Ramzipoor has fashioned a compelling historical thriller that details the 18 days in which Aubrion and his team managed to write, print, and distribute their astounding parody. After being rounded up by the Nazis and told to fabricate articles for Le Soir about the evils of the Allies or face execution, Aubrion and his colleagues decided to go a different way, knowing that to do so would almost certainly mean their deaths. Mixing real-life figures and fictional characters, Ramzipoor tells the story in flashback, from the point of view of one of the troupe called Gamin, a young woman posing as a newsboy to survive on the streets of Brussels, who documents the Faux Soir story to a modern-day journalist, who has her own ties to the gang of six intrepid conspirators. The stories of the six are all fleshed out in such a way that readers will be wanting to hear more about each one of them, and layered over the personal drama is the remarkable saga of how 50,000 copies of a newspaper were published under the thumb of the gestapo. This is a long book, but it is never less than engrossing.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)

July 12, 2019

It's the dark days of World War II, and Belgium is under German occupation. Despite the risks of opposing the Nazi regime, several stalwart citizens decide to fight back as best they can by pretending to collaborate but instead publishing a fake edition of the Belgian newspaper Le Soir, which they call Faux [False] Soir. First novelist Ramzipoor bases this engrossing novel on real-life events and extensive research. In fact, some 60,000 copies of Faux Soir were sold, all produced and distributed in just 18 days. The author enlists a colorful crew of characters, each with an original "name," to accomplish this highly dangerous feat, some of them based on actual personalities. These include the orchestrator Aubrion (Jester); street orphan Gamin, a girl passing for a boy (Pyromaniac); Tarcovich, a lesbian prostitute (Smuggler); and Spiegelman, a gay Jewish man (Gastromancer). VERDICT The narrative is periodically interspersed with an interview in the present between Eliza (Scrivener) and Helene, who was Gamin. Athough readers may occasionally find this complex tale tricky to follow because the development is presented from different perspectives of the principal characters, their persistence will be rewarded. Highly recommended for readers who appreciate fine fiction grounded in history. [See Prepub Alert, 2/4/19.]--Edward B. Cone, New York

Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

July 12, 2019

In 1943 Brussels, the Germans gave a stark choice to dissidents arrested for distributing anti-Nazi newspapers: write Nazi propaganda or face death. The group instead decided to lampoon Hitler in their own secret edition of Le Soir, a leading paper-turned-Nazi rag. Based on actual events; with a 75,000-copy first printing.

Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.