Book picks similar to
The Rings of Berlin by Michael Wallace
fiction
literary
stand-alone-novel
20th-century
The Yard Dog
Sheldon Russell - 2009
This conspiracy reaches the highest echelons of the camp and beyond and will push Hook and Runt to their physical and mental limits.Hook is a complex character, equal parts rough and vulnerable, an unlikely and unwilling hero. He is more than matched by Dr. Reina Kaplan, a Jewish big-city transplant to Camp Alva who is battling her own demons and has been put in charge of educating the Nazi inmates in the basics of democracy before their eventual return to Germany.Vivid descriptions of period detail, stark landscapes, and unique characters make this first book in the Hook Runyon series a fascinating mystery full of tension and deep insight.
Light of the Moon
Elizabeth Buchan - 1992
Set in resistance France, this is a grand and passionate story of forbidden love between an English Special Operations Executive and a German Abwehr officer.
Child of the Forest: Based on the Life Story of Charlene Perlmutter Schiff
Jack L. Grossman - 2018
Alone, starving, freezing at times, and running and hiding for her life, Musia sought refuge in the forest for two years while Holocaust death camps loomed nearby. Child of the Forest is based on the true story and tribulations of Shulamit "Musia" Perlmutter, born in 1929 to Simcha and Fruma Perlmutter, and stands as a memorial to her extraordinary courage.
Voices From The Forest: The True Story of Abram and Julia Bobrow
Stephen Paper - 2019
Abram and Julia Bobrow escaped from the Nazi death squads and fled to the vast forests of Byelorussia where they learned to survive with little food, shelter or warm clothing. Finally adapting to the severe conditions, they began to do little things like cutting telephone wires or tearing up railroad tracks. Still, they were never more than one step ahead of the SS and their auxiliaries—units bent on destroying the partisan movement and ridding Europe of its Jewish population. Most partisan groups were made up of Soviet soldiers and they wouldn't accept anyone who didn't have their own weapons. Julia was lucky and was accepted to a Russian group as a nurse; Abram’s group consisted of himself, his brother Label and his father. They had a sawed-off rifle and one pistol with six bullets. Abram and Label used their first two bullets to kill two peasants that had turned in their aunt and her children for blood money. The story is told in Abram's own words.
Undaunted: The Tiger of Auschwitz
Garmaine Pitchon - 2016
That is where Garmaine Pitchon was when Hitler ascended to power and unleashed a diabolical scheme to annihilate the Jewish race. Follow along as Eli Gonzalez tells Garmaine story in a vibrant, chilling, and compelling narrative. Always a rambunctious, curious girl, Garmaine found a way to not wear the yellow Star of David and got to experience more than most before Garmaine experienced loss at an epic proportion. Her entire family was murdered, beginning with her grandmother, killed in her own grocery store by a Nazi officer who forced her to make him a sandwich as she walked over her just-murdered beloved grandmother’s warm, flowing blood. Experience the horror of the 9-Day train ride to Auschwitz and become a first hand witness to when it was only Nazi’s and Jews and the veil was pulled off and absolute evil abounded. Yet, there is something about Garmaine’s story, something divine that happened. What was meant to destroy her strengthened her. What was meant to stop her lineage became a force to help desperate mothers years after. When there is a divine purpose for your life and that of your family, no one and nothing can stop it.
Youth in Flames: A Teenager's Resistance and Her Fight for Survival in the Warsaw Ghetto
Aliza Vitis-Shomron - 2015
In September 1939, when the Nazis began their reign of terror in Europe and invaded Poland, Aliza was eleven years old. In her diaries—furtively written on scraps of precious paper that she kept throughout the war—she described the history of her family, struggling to survive in the occupied Warsaw Ghetto. Those diaries and later writings formed the basis for this memoir. Becoming a member of Hashomer Hatzair, the noted youth movement in the Warsaw Ghetto, gave Aliza hope and encouraged her to fight for survival. As a result of an extraordinary series of “miracles,” Aliza managed to survive after being sent to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. She was among those liberated by American troops, and she has continued to tell the story throughout her life. Aliza is among the last of the Warsaw Ghetto survivors. She has been passionately lecturing around the world about the revolt, and she has escorted numerous youth groups on their visits to Poland. This book has been previously translated and published in Hungarian, Polish, and Hebrew.
The Woman at the Gates
Chrystyna Lucyk-Berger - 2021
Her sister lifted her other little boy into the back of the truck. Under the threatening gaze of the Germans, Antonia looked back at the village one last time before the flap dropped and locked them all in total darkness.Before Antonia and her sister's family were surrounded by the Gestapo and sent to a concentration camp, she was a fighter rather than a victim. Her resistance group - made up of the young men and women she’d grown up with - risked everything to free their country from those who had turned it into a bloody battleground. By her side was the brilliant Dr. Viktor Gruber - the man she was to have married and help start an independent government with. His love and his intellect shone like a light even when dark and violent conflicts engulfed them.Antonia does not know whether Viktor or the others have been caught or executed. Inside the camp, rumors are that the war is coming to an end. But she cannot wait to be saved. Her precious nephews will die without proper food. Her sister is ill. And her brother-in-law is somewhere out of reach. The Nazis need every able slave to push back the Red Tide, but Antonia also knows she and the others could be killed for any reason, at any moment.Outside the gates lies salvation and promises she must fulfill - for her country and the people she has loved. But Antonia's first priority is to find a way to get her family to safety, even if means putting her own life at risk. The Nazis may have taken nearly everything from her - her country, her dreams, her passions - but they will never take away her fierce courage…Inspired by the author's research into her family's journeys from Ukraine to the United States, The Woman at the Gates is a heartbreaking, inspiring and unforgettable story of the faith, courage and determination shown by those who survived the darkest days of the war. Fans of Mandy Robotham, Kate Quinn and Pam Jenoff will be gripped from the very first page until the final, heart-stopping conclusion, and if you enjoyed Mark Sullivan's The Last Green Valley or Beneath a Scarlet Sky, you will not want to miss this action-packed epic!
The Canal Bridge
Tom Phelan - 2005
A year later, while en route to India, their troop ship is recalled and they soon find themselves in the European slaughterhouse that was World War I. As stretcher bearers, the two men witness all too closely the horrors of the battlefield and the trenches, the savagery, and the unconscionable waste of human life on fields made liquid by “the blood and guts of boy soldiers” at the Somme, Ypres, and Passchendaele. Meanwhile, back home in Ireland, Con’s sister and Matthias’s lover, Kitty Hatchel, yearns for their safe return and reminds them of their carefree childhood on the banks of the local canal, as well as their hopes for the future.Brilliantly and movingly narrated by a chorus of voices from the community — Matt, Con, Kitty, and others — The Canal Bridge tells the story of how the young men take Ballyrannel to war with them, and how the war comes back home when hostilities end in Europe. The Ireland the friends left in 1913 no longer exists, for the political landscape has been transformed by the Rising against the British in 1916. It is now a land riven with sectarian tensions and bloodshed from which there is no escape.
The Kaminsky Cure
Christopher New - 2005
The matriarch, Gabi, was born Jewish but converted to Christianity in her teens. The patriarch, Willibald, is a Lutheran minister who, on one hand is an admirer of Hitler, but on the other hand, the conflicted father of children who are half-Jewish. Mindful and resentful of her husband’s ambivalence, Gabi is determined to make sure her children are educated, devising schemes to keep them in school even after learning that any child less than 100% Aryan will eventually be kept from completing education. She even hires tutors who are willing to teach half-Jewish children and in this way comes to hire Fraulein Kaminsky who shows Gabi how to cure her frustration and rage: to keep her mouth filled with water until the urge to scream or rant has passed.This beautifully rendered novel of WWII, “seen through a child’s eye, makes delusion and hypocrisy shockingly stark.” (The Guardian)
The Long Path Home
Ellen Lindseth - 2020
From desperate small-town teen to star of the burlesque circuit, Violet Ernte has survived tough choices and more than one reinvention. Now, framed for an underworld murder, she has one way out: agree to keep Marcie, a reckless USO showgirl and mobster’s daughter, on the straight and narrow. Vi’s new act: play innocent ingenue and join the all-American song-and-dance troupe bound for overseas to a war-torn Italy.When a USO headliner goes missing soon after landing, the disappearance has treacherous implications for the entire troupe. With Marcie’s safety in peril, Vi turns to battle-roughened army sergeant Ansel Danger for help. But getting closer to Ansel means exposing her past and her double life of scandal and deception. And in a heartbeat, she could lose everything.Defiant and resilient, Vi is used to taking risks. This time it’s for redemption. To love, and to be loved. And for a second chance at a future she thought was lost forever.
Carolina Skeletons
David Stout - 1988
Forty-four years later, Bragg's nephew travels to South Carolina to discover the truth--and finds himself on the Wanted List and fighting for his own freedom! HC: Mysterious Press.
In Alexa's Shoes
Rochelle Alexandra - 2019
Loaded onto cattle trucks, they are transported to an unknown destination. Terror and uncertainty become the new normal. Life is a continuous nightmare as she is selected by a Gestapo officer’s wife, destined to become little more than their slave.Separated from everyone she loves Alexa relies on her Christian faith, inner strength and courage, to endure through her long nightmare. Her story takes her on a treacherous journey across war-ravaged Europe in search of her family and the life she once knew. Despite living through unimaginable hardships and life-threatening danger, Alexa feels that someone, or something, seems to be looking out for her. Years later, she finds out that not all was as it seemed, as hidden secrets from this dark period in history are revealed to her.In Alexa’s Shoes is a historical novel that beckons the reader to follow in the footsteps of a real-life individual who walks by faith to triumph over tragedy, one step at a time. It is based on the true story of the author’s grandmother.
The Katyn Order
Douglas W. Jacobson - 2011
In Warsaw, Resistance fighters rise up against their Nazi occupiers, but the Germans retaliate, ruthlessly leveling the once-beautiful city. American Adam Nowak has been dropped into Poland by British intelligence as an assassin and Resistance fighter. During the Warsaw Uprising he meets Natalia, a covert operative who has lost everything—just as he has. Amid the Allied power struggle left by Germany’s defeat, Adam and Natalia join in a desperate hunt for the 1940 Soviet order authorizing the murders of 20,000 Polish army officers and civilians. If they can find the Katyn Order before the Russians do, they just might change the fate of Poland.
Wolf
Herbert J. Stern - 2020
. . but Will Soon Become the Ultimate One: Adolf Hitler.Perhaps no man on Earth is more controversial, more hated, or more studied than Adolf Hitler. His exploits and every move are well-documented, from the time he first became chancellor and then dictator of Germany to starting World War II to the systematic killing of millions of Jews. But how did he achieve power, and what was the makeup of the mind of a man who would deliberately inflict unimaginable horrors on millions of people?Meet Friedrich Richard, an amnesiac soldier who, in 1918, encounters Hitler in the mental ward at Pasewalk Hospital. Hitler, then a corporal, diagnosed as a psychopath and helpless, suffering from hysterical blindness, introduces himself as Wolf to Friedrich and becomes dependent upon Friedrich for assistance, forming an unbreakable bond between the two men.Follow Friedich—our protagonist—who interacts with real people, places, and events, through the fifteen-year friendship that witnesses Hitler turn from a quiet painter into a megalomaniacal dictator. Using brand-new historical research to construct a realistic portrait of the evolving Hitler, Wolf will satisfy, by turns, history buffs and fiction fans alike. And as this complex story is masterfully presented, it answers the question of how a nondescript man became the world’s greatest monster.
Last Train from Kummersdorf
Leslie Wilson - 2004
The Russian armies are closing in. When Hanno Frisch sees his twin brother killed, he's had enough. On the run, he meets streetwise Effi. She's on her way to the West to find her father, who's in the US Army. Effi's learned the hard way that she must keep secrets to herself - and she's even less keen to trust Hanno when she finds out he's a policeman's son. But there are far more dangerous people on the road: Russian soldiers, German deserters - and Major Otto, who likes to play games with people before he kills them.