NEVER ANYONE BUT YOU by Rupert Thomson

A beautiful and true love story of life long devotion, beginning when Suzette and Lucie meet as children, feeling an instant attraction to each other. Suzette the writer, the photographer, the observer, the memory keeper drawn to the mercurial and volatile Lucie, overflowing with artistic talent. These two meet during the wonderful hedonistic years between the two wars. In a bizarre twist they become step sisters through the marriage of their parents, further bonding them for life. 

They take it upon themselves to challenge the norms of the time by changing their names to  Claude Chahun and Marcel Moore, cutting their hair, dressing in trousers. They live and breathe the bohemian lifestyle of Paris at this time, their artistic expression finding its perfect place in the surrealism art movement of the day. 

They had moved to the island of Jersey by the time the war started, and almost immediately continued to push the boundaries with their own form of resistance. The war years were hard on the people of the Channel Islands, Suzette and Lucie certainly suffering their share. But their bravery, their strength and their devotion to each other is inspiring, beautiful, and sees them through. 

It's a novel, but is also a true story. At times it reads more like a biography  than a novel, becoming a little ponderous and slow page turner. Then at other times the magic of the love takes over, and the writing takes on a lyrical quality worthy of the two artists the story is about. There is certainly a lot more action once the pair decamp to Jersey, outwitting the Germans, the full power and strength of their love shining through. I loved  the love story, the life long commitment to each other, through thick and thin. A marriage in everything but name.