On Encore today, we have Australian author, Natasha Lester who was last on the show in August, 2020 with her international best seller, The Paris Secret. Encore, you may recall, is the show where we talk to authors who've already been on Binge Reading about their latest book.

Hi there, I'm your host, Jenny Wheeler, and today on Binge Reading, Natasha returns to talk about her latest World War II spy saga, The Three Lives of Alix St Pierre. A story that Kate Quinn has called a “triple-stranded-delight.”

American ex-spy Alix returns to Paris in 1947, determined to build a new life for herself, with a fascinating job in the house of Christian Dior.

But among the bolts of silk and Ritz cocktails an old enemy lies in wait. Alix must reach back unto her wartime past to try and trap her enemy. hoping it is not too late to build a new future out from under his shadow.

Natasha Lester The Paris Secret - Binge Reading August 2020:

www.thejoysofbingereading.com/natasha-lester-paris-secrets/

Historical Fiction - Free Giveaway

Our Giveaway this week is a great range of free historical fiction, my book, Sadie's Vow, the first book in the new Home At Last series included.

FREE BOOKS GIVEAWAY

As usual, links for everything to do with this episode, how to access those free books and anything else I might've been talking about with Natasha can be found in the show notes for this episode on the website, The Joys of Binge Reading.com. And if you like the show, why not leave us a comment so others will find us too.

Links in this episode

Karl Wolf, Nazi SS officer responsible for many deaths:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Wolff

Allan Dulles: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_Dulles

Galerie Dior: https://www.galeriedior.com/

Staffette: The women of the Italian Resistance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_women_in_the_Italian_Resistance

Rita Hayworth and Gilda: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilda

Dior exhibitions:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/15/arts/design/christian-dior-costume-institute-met-review.html

https://www.vogue.com/article/christian-dior-retrospective-fall-2017-couture

Diablesse dress Alix wears in the book: From Natasha Lester’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/p/Caio9ESPrFY/

Where to find Natasha online:

Website: www.natashalester.com.au

Instagram: @natashalesterauthor

But now, here's Natasha.

Introducing author Natasha Lester

Natasha Lester - World War II romantic adventures

Jenny Wheeler: We know from our last talk that you have got a long-standing passion for Dior, so tell us about that briefly.

Natasha Lester: I have. But this book was a bit of an accident in terms of how Dior was woven into the story, I have to say. I mean, I love his gowns.

I think he really revolutionized fashion. He is one of the few designers who can lay claim to having changed fashion so radically.

But for this one, because I was really interested in what happened to women after the war.

They had amazing independence, they'd been able to earn their own money, work in any job anywhere during the wartime, because all the men were away. And then suddenly the men came back from the war and women were actively dissuaded from working and told to return to the home and return to the kitchen. And I wanted to examine what that might've felt like for women.

And tied up in all of that is the New Look. And Dior is often scapegoated as being part of that re-domestication of women. But I think that's oversimplifying it.

I think it's much more complicated than that. And in fact, I think that actually, his aim was to celebrate women, at a time where women were told to return to the background and he was trying to bring them back to the foreground.

So in some ways, he was doing the opposite of what he's often blamed for.

Dion was a cultural marker for gender relations

For this particular story,