PASTEL ORPHANS
As a small boy, Henrik watches his world crumble around him as Germany falls under Nazi control and his Jewish friends are sent away. In his own unique telling, Henrik confides in the reader the events surrounding World War II, as his family is plunged into fear and uncertainty.
When his sister is stolen by Germans for Aryan testing, and his mother is injured during the kidnapping, Henrik’s childhood is cut short.
Determined, brave, and unfailingly loyal to his sister and those who befriend him, Henrik will play his part in the fight against this strange new world of violence and oppression. And love will arise from the fragments of broken lives.
I borrowed the name Solomon from my ancestor, Joseph Solomon, a convict sent to Van Diemen's Land.
Read about him here.
|
BROKEN ANGELS
Imprisoned in the Lodz Ghetto, Elsi discovers her mother’s desperate attempt to end her pregnancy and comes face-to-face with the impossibility of their situation. Risking her own life, Elsi joins a resistance group to sabotage the regime.
Blonde, blue-eyed Matilda is wrenched from her family in Romania and taken to Germany, where her captors attempt to mold her into the perfect Aryan child. Spirited and brave, she must inspire hope in the other stolen children to make her dreams of escape a reality.
Willem, a high-ranking Nazi doctor, plans to save lives when he takes posts in both the ghetto and Auschwitz. After witnessing unimaginable cruelties, he begins to question his role and the future of those he is ordered to destroy. |
THE ROAD BEYOND RUIN
August 1945. As Stefano, an Italian POW, heads toward home across war-ravaged Germany, he encounters a young child beside his dead mother. Unable to leave him to an unknown fate, Stefano takes the boy with him, finding refuge in a seemingly abandoned house in a secluded woodland.
But the house is far from vacant. Stefano wakes at the arrival of its owner, Erich, a former German soldier, who invites the travelers to stay until they can find safe passage home. Stefano cautiously agrees, intrigued by the disarming German, his reclusive neighbor Rosalind, and her traumatized husband, Georg. Stefano is also drawn to Monique, the girl in a photograph on Rosalind’s wall, who went missing during the war.
But when he discovers letters written by Monique, a darker truth emerges. This place of refuge could be one of reckoning, and the secrets of the past might prevent the travelers from ever getting home. |
IN A FIELD OF BLUE
England 1922. It’s been four years since Rudy’s brother Edgar went missing in war-torn France. Still deep in mourning and grappling with unanswered questions, Rudy and his mother struggle to move on. When the enigmatic Mariette arrives unexpectedly at the family’s manor claiming to be Edgar’s widow, and the mother of his child, Rudy urges her to stay, hoping she’ll shed light on the missing pieces.
Captivated by Mariette, Rudy finds that their mutual loss and grief bind them…as does the possibility of new love. But Mariette’s revelations bring more questions than answers about Edgar’s death. Suspicions threaten to divide Rudy’s already fractured family, setting him on a quest for the truth that takes him from England to France and beyond.
In his search, Rudy is forced to confront the tragedies of war and the realities of the brother he’s lost and the woman he’s found. Will the truth set him free to find peace, or will it forever shadow his future? |
HALF IN SHADOW
An unforgettable novel about courage, love, and consequences at the dawn of World War I. 1915.
In German-occupied Belgium, a tragic loss forces Josephine Descharmes to navigate dangerous new territory. By day it’s compliance, serving German officers at the Hotel Métropole. By night it’s resistance, working with her brothers underground to help Allied soldiers and civilians cross the border into Holland.
Both paths put her and her family at great risk. As Josephine struggles to keep her family safe, Arthur, a grief-stricken English soldier trapped behind enemy lines, finds purpose and hope with Josephine and her work. Meanwhile, Franz, a German officer remorseful for the casualties of war, offers her protection and opportunity. These two men from opposing sides will open her heart and test her loyalties. Amid the sorrows of war and threats of mortal danger and betrayal, Josephine must steer her own fate.
In a country deprived of freedom, she will make an impossible choice—one that will forever impact the family she cherishes and the man she loves. |
AN AGE OF WINTERS
In the seventeenth century, witchfinders rule and paranoia thrives in a chilling novel about unrequited love, persecution, and betrayal.
In 1625, the Franconian village of Eisbach has been plagued by disease, famine, heinous crimes, and a merciless winter. Katarin Jaspers is the maidservant to the enigmatic Reverend Zacharias Engel, appointed by Rome to cure the village of suspected diabolism and save every God-fearing soul.
Zacharias soon finds his first witch, and the public burning of a local man could spell the end of misfortune. As a sense of peace settles over the village, Katarin finds herself increasingly infatuated with Zacharias, who is a disruption to her predictable existence and a balm for her cruel past. But peace for Katarin is short-lived. Margaretha Katz—the new midwife—is seen as a rival for the reverend’s attention. Fear and recrimination reach a fever pitch when a great tragedy sets the town fully on edge.
With the walls of winter closing in around Eisbach once again, rumours flourish and villagers turn on each other. Now, no one is safe from the pyre. |
