An Address in Amsterdam
A Novel
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4.4 • 53 Ratings
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
A Kirkus Indie Book of the Month
Winner, Sarton Women's Book Award for Historical Fiction
When the Germans invade her city, Rachel Klein is a teenager falling in love. Within a year, she's delivering illegal papers and confronting Nazi soldiers. In this “compelling and touching tale” (Laurel Corona), Rachel finds her courage and faces wrenching choices.
Follow Rachel Klein as she faces double danger as a young Jewish woman and resistance worker in the Amsterdam of Anne Frank.
On May 10, 1940, the Nazi bombers blast the night and shatter Rachel Klein's sleep—along with her life as she knew it. She's eighteen, and falling in love with a Gentile in a secret relationship. As the Nazi terror escalates, her romance deepens quickly, and so does her boyfriend's involvement with student protests. Soon, he must disappear rather than face arrest. When Rachel witnesses the first roundup of 425 Jewish men in the Jonas Daniel Meijerplein, she knows that she too must act, and joins the resistance.
Despite the ever greater danger as the Nazis tighten their grip on the city, Rachel makes daily deliveries of illegal papers to addresses all over Amsterdam. She ingeniously evades the Nazis and their Dutch collaborators for months, although she has some close calls. As the roundups intensify, Rachel agonizes about whether to go into hiding. Ultimately she persuades her parents to accompany her to a dank basement, where she gets to know herself and them in a different way, and meets a new man.
A young woman can find her courage in any situation, no matter how terrible, and love is always a possibility.
Customer Reviews
Great Look Into History
I have read quite a few stories about World War II, but most were about events that took place in Germany or England. This was a very different one for me, taking place in Amsterdam. A place where the Jewish population was almost wiped out by the end of WWII. The people of Amsterdam never thought the war would come to them. They had lived peacefully for years and hadn't gotten involved in WWII. They thought it was pass them by.
But as we know, it did not just pass them by. Rachel Klein, a young Jewish woman, finds herself caught up in all of it. As she watches the Nazi's take over her city and country, she knows she can't stand by and watch it happen. When her friends and neighbors are hauled away to placed unknown to never be heard from again, she turns from an innocent girl without many cares, into one of the best messengers with the resistance.
Putting her life on the line countless times to help fellow Jews and those that support them, the time comes where it's too dangerous for her to continue and she goes into hiding with her family.
This was an incredibly uplifting story of how one person can make a difference in other's lives. But it was also an incredibly sad tale of one of the worst times in human history. Well written, and from what I can tell, well researched, An Address in Amsterdam was a chilling look into human nature and history that we should never forget.
Poor ending
I felt cheated...the ending was not an ending...I personally felt that I read the whole book and it was time wasted..