β Scribed by Sarah McCoy
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
In 1945, Elsie Schmidt was a naΓ―ve teenager, as eager for her first sip of champagne as she was for her first kiss. But in the waning days of the Nazi empire, with food scarce and fears of sedition mounting, even the private yearnings of teenage girls were subject to suspicion and suppression. Elsieβs courtship by Josef Hub, a rising star in the Army of the Third Reich, has insulated her and her family from the terror and desperation overtaking her country. So when an escaped Jewish boy arrives on Elsieβs doorstep in the dead of night on Christmas Eve, Elsie understands that opening the door puts all she loves in danger.
Sixty years later, in El Paso, Texas, Reba Adams is trying to file a feel-good Christmas piece for the local magazine. Reba is a rolling stone, perpetually on the run from memories of a turbulent childhood, but sheβs been in El Paso long enough to get a full-time job and a full-time fiancΓ©, Riki Chavez. Riki, an agent with the U.S. Border Patrol, finds comfort in strict rules and regulations, whereas Reba knows that in every good story, lines will be blurred.
Reba's latest assignment has brought her to the shop of an elderly baker across town. The interview should take a few hours at most, but the owner of Elsie's German Bakery is no easy subject. Elsie keeps turning the tables on Reba, and Reba finds herself returning to the bakery again and again, anxious to find the heart of the story. For Elsie, Reba's questions have been a stinging reminder of darker times: her life in Germany during that last bleak year of WWII. And as Elsie, Reba, and Riki's lives become more intertwined, all are forced to confront the uncomfortable truths of the past and seek out the courage to forgive.
π SIMILAR VOLUMES
In 1945, Elsie Schmidt was a naΓ―ve teenager, as eager for her first sip of champagne as she was for her first kiss. But in the waning days of the Nazi empire, with food scarce and fears of sedition mounting, even the private yearnings of teenage girls were subject to suspicion and suppression. Elsie
It's 1952, and after losing several jobs, twenty-year-old Rona reluctantly agrees to help her father run his bakery shop. Life in the small seaside town of Kirkham is quiet and uneventful, with many of the young lads still away on National Service, and Rona feels nothing will ever change. She dreams
Cookie Monster is baking loads of his favorite cookies at the Sesame Street Bakery. But the tasty treats get gobbled up so fast by his friends--Elmo, Big Bird, Grover, Bert, Ernie, and the others--that Cookie never even gets to taste them! Will he ever get to eat one of his own cookies? Lots of humo