The World That We Knew (Paperback)
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NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
On the brink of World War II, with the Nazis tightening their grip on Berlin, a mother’s act of courage and love offers her daughter a chance of survival.
“[A] hymn to the power of resistance, perseverance, and enduring love in dark times…gravely beautiful…Hoffman the storyteller continues to dazzle.” —THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
In Berlin, at the time when the world changed, Hanni Kohn knows she must send her twelve-year-old daughter away to save her from the Nazi regime. She finds her way to a renowned rabbi, but it’s his daughter, Ettie, who offers hope of salvation when she creates a mystical Jewish creature, a rare and unusual golem, who is sworn to protect Lea. Once Ava is brought to life, she and Lea and Ettie become eternally entwined, their paths fated to cross, their fortunes linked.
Lea and Ava travel from Paris, where Lea meets her soulmate, to a convent in western France known for its silver roses; from a school in a mountaintop village where three thousand Jews were saved. Meanwhile, Ettie is in hiding, waiting to become the fighter she's destined to be.
What does it mean to lose your mother? How much can one person sacrifice for love? In a world where evil can be found at every turn, we meet remarkable characters that take us on a stunning journey of loss and resistance, the fantastical and the mortal, in a place where all roads lead past the Angel of Death and love is never ending.
The World That We Knew by Alice Hoffman Reading Group Guide - Click to Download
Praise
Received the 2020 Dayton Peace Prize for Fiction and the 2019 National Jewish Book Club Award
Winner of the 2019 Julia Ward Howe Prize
Featured on The New York Times Paperback Row List for October 2020
Made the LA Times October 2020 Bestsellers List
Recognized by The Seattle Times and the Winston-Salem Journal as one of Fall 2020's new paperbacks to help freshen up your fall reading list