This book blew my mind. It really opened my eyes to see what happened to the children who lived in Ukraine during World War II. Most people are aware of the horrible tragedies like Pearl Harbor and the Holocaust, but a particular program was so hidden from the world that even now most people have never heard of it.
In this book the main character’s name is Nadia. Most people would think that Nadia is a strange girl. She is very quiet and almost never talks. As Nadia’s story unfolds through her memory, flashbacks, and nightmares, the reader discovers that her past is deeper and darker then she could ever imagine. She tries to remember who she really is, but she soon gets a disturbing flashback about her with a family of Nazis. Now her biggest fear is that she was the enemy.
The book is based off of the Lebensborn program. The Lebensborn program is part of the reason Hitler lost WWII. In addition to Hitler persecuting all the Jewish people in Europe, he also intended to re-populate the European countries with an Aryan race. He took children (mostly from Ukraine), brainwashed them into thinking that their real parents were assassins, and their siblings were evil spies. Then he placed them into homes of Nazis sympathizers to be manipulated and raised according to the Nazi agenda. The complexity of this program plus fighting the Allies contributed to the overextension of his resources for the war.
Overall I learned a lot from this book and really liked it! It also happens to be one of a three-part series. And what book enthusiast doesn’t love a good series?
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