But the Germans left in a hurry when the war ended, abandoning their estimated 700 bunkers and everything in them. Since they’re probably there for eternity, the people of Guernsey have made the best of them. O’Neill’s rock band used to rehearse in one. Others have used them to grow mushrooms and store fish. “We’ve seen people use them for billiards,’’ said Molly Bihet, author of several books on Guernsey’s wartime history. “They’re solid and they’re warm because they’re well insulated.’’
Until recently, the occupation has been a little-known footnote to World War ll history. The harbor was bombed in 1940, killing 41 civilians. Half the population and most of the schoolchildren were evacuated, and all residents not born on the island were deported and interned in camps. Thousands of slave workers from German occupied territories were shipped to the island, starved, and worked - in many cases - to death.
But in the last year the island (population about 65,000) has been thrust from near-obscurity into the international limelight with the surprise success of an American book, “The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society’’ (The Dial Press/Random House), by first-time novelist Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows. It was named one of the best books of 2008 by Time, The Washington Post, and other publications; the paperback has more than a million copies in print.
Written as a series of letters exchanged after the war, the novel tells intertwining stories of romance and the occupation. Because a subplot revolves around the eccentric members of the literary society, it’s been a particular hit among book groups; nearly 57,000 of them from the United States entered a contest sponsored by the publisher to win a trip to Guernsey.
