Skipping the glamour and glitz this time around, Steel (most
recently, Second Chance, p. 473) makes a well-meaning attempt at a
serious WWII tale (with star-crossed lovers, of course). Steel
begins her tale, however, in 1915, some months after the Great War
has begun. Beata Wittgenstein, the daughter of an upper-class,
patriotic German-Jewish family, falls in love with a man she meets
by chance: Antoine de Vallerand, who's Catholic and French. While
he's handsome, brilliant, and charming, Antoine is not at all the
sort of suitor the Wittgensteins had in mind for their lovely,
studious, dutiful daughter. The Vallerand family is equally
outraged. Nonetheless, Beata converts to Catholicism to marry
Antoine, though her father, Jacob, declares his daughter dead to
him from that day on. She decides not to tell her children that she
is Jewish-a fateful decision for her daughter Amadea. Years later,
Antoine breaks his neck in a riding accident, dying instantly. The
grieving Beata becomes deeply religious and urges Amadea to live up
to her name and enter a convent, though she still knows nothing of
her Jewish background. When the Wittgensteins are killed during
Kristallnacht, Beata confesses everything to her other daughter,
Daphne, but not Amadea, hoping to protect her. Later, as WWII
rages, Amadea is singled out by an unknown informer, rounded up
with other French Jews, and sent to Theriesenstadt. She escapes and
joins the French Resistance (where she meets handsome Serge,
underground leader). Then, burned and paralyzed by a railroad bomb,
she is airlifted to England (where she meets handsome Rupert, who's
looking after a houseful of war orphans). Will she ever walk again?
Will she return to the convent? Or marry Rupert? Get out your
hankies, ladies. Steel put her all into this one. (Kirkus Reviews)
For the Wittgenstein family, the summer of 1915 was a time of both
prosperity and unease. But for eldest daughter Beata, it was a time
of awakening. By glimmering Lake Geneva, the quiet Jewish beauty
met a young French officer and fell in love. Knowing that her
parents would never accept her marriage to a Catholic, Beata
followed her heart anyway. But Beata's past would stay with her,
and when Europe faces war once again, Beata must watch in horror as
Hitler's terror threatens her family - even her daughter Amadea,
who has taken on the vows of a Carmelite nun. As family and friends
are swept away without a trace, Amadea is forced into hiding. Thus
begins a harrowing journey of survival, first in the Nazi death
camps and then as she escapes into the heart of the French
resistance and finds a renewed sense of purpose. In the darkest
moments of fear, Amada will feel her mother's loving strength as
the voices of lost loved ones echo powerfully in her life. She will
meet an extraordinary man, British secret agent Rupert Montgomery,
who will help her discover her place in an unbreakable chain
between generations...between her lost family and her future.
desperation of Germany's death camps, Danielle Steel weaves an
intricate tapestry of a mother's love, a daughter's courage...and
the unwavering faith that sustained them - even in history's
darkest hour.
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