Dancing with the Enemy

Set on Jersey in the Channel Islands in 1940 when the German army takes over the island, the story is told from the perspective of Dr Hugh Jackson who decides to remain on the island to tend to his patients, teenager, Tom Gaskell, who with two friends attempts to escape from the island and ends up being a prisoner of the Germans, and Xanthe Maxwell, a young doctor from Australia who visits Jersey in 2019. Xanthe becomes interested in the history of Jersey during the Second World War when she reads Dr Jackson's diary and meets Bob Blampied who lived in Jersey during the German occupation.

Dancing with the Enemy by Diane Armstrong shows the affects of German occupation of this small island on the citizens of Jersey and how they struggled to survive. It shows how people react in different ways to extreme stress - some risking all to help others while some protect themslves by reporting neighbours to the enemy or working with them. It is a study of survival, loss and of hope. 

While learning of this period of Jersey's history, Xanthe finds family connections to the island and also decides, with the assistance of Daniel, how she wants to approach the next stage of her life.

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society is a story of the affects of German occupation on the neighbouring island of Guernsey.