"LILAC GIRLS," by Martha Hall Kelly, Ballantine Press, $26, 497 pages (f)
“Lilac Girls” by Martha Hall Kelly may change the way one thinks about World War II. To paraphrase one of the book’s characters, "excellent" is a word often overused, but here it is completely appropriate. For readers who think they know World War II, this is a must-read.
The story begins in September 1939 and explores the lives of three women who live in very different circumstances. Caroline Ferriday is a New Yorker and one of the upper crust, but she works tirelessly to help others through her volunteer work at the French Consulate.
Then there is Kasia Kuzmerick, a Polish teenager who is just figuring out who she loves when Poland is invaded and her world disintegrates before her eyes.
Lastly, Herta Oberheuser is a young German woman who knows she wants to be a surgeon, however, in Hitler’s Germany, women are supposed to be at home, making Aryan babies.
The story spans 20 years as the three women have experiences very different from one another’s but that intersect over the course of the book.
Caroline go through a tragic love affair with a French actor. She has no children or family of her own and keeps working to help supply French orphanages. Oberheuser is a believer of Nazism and answers an ad for a doctor at a women’s re-education camp in Ravensbrück so she can follow her dream, but soon learns what really goes on there. At first she abhors it, but then she tolerates it and eventually embraces it. Kasia wants to impress Peitrik, who works for the underground resistance movement, but she gets caught, taking her mother and sister with her. Their final destination is Ravensbrück.
The violence and sexual content are not graphic, but the book deals with very adult themes and situations appropriate to the context of the story. There is no profanity. “Lilac Girls” is Kelly’s debut novel, and readers should look forward to more from her.
Kent Larson is originally from Phoenix. He loves family, writing, reading, music and movies. He's been teaching English forever and still loves it. Find him at linkedin.com/in/MisterLarson.