Genre Fiction
![Armando Lucas Correa - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_a_armando_lucas_correa.jpg)
The Night Travelers: A Novel
Four generations of women experience love, loss, war, and hope from the rise of Nazism to the Cuban Revolution and finally, the fall of the Berlin Wall in this sweeping novel from the bestselling author of the "timely must-read" (People) The German Girl.
Berlin, 1931: Ally Keller, a talented young poet, is alone and scared when she gives birth to a mixed-race daughter she names Lilith. As the Nazis rise to power, Ally knows she must keep her baby in the shadows to protect her against Hitler's deadly ideology of Aryan purity. But as she grows, it becomes more and more difficult to keep Lilith hidden so Ally sets in motion a dangerous and desperate plan to send her daughter across the ocean to safety.
Havana, 1958: Now an adult, Lilith has few memories of her mother or her childhood in Germany. Besides, she's too excited for her future with her beloved Martin, a Cuban pilot with strong ties to the Batista government. But as the flames of revolution ignite, Lilith and her newborn daughter, Nadine, find themselves at a terrifying crossroads.
Berlin, 1988: As a scientist in Berlin, Nadine is dedicated to ensuring the dignity of the remains of all those who were murdered by the Nazis. Yet she has spent her entire lifetime avoiding the truth about her own family's history. It takes her daughter, Luna, to encourage Nadine to uncover the truth about the choices her mother and grandmother made to ensure the survival of their children. And it will fall to Luna to come to terms with a shocking betrayal that changes everything she thought she knew about her family's past.
Separated by time but united by sacrifice, four women embark on journeys of self-discovery and find themselves to be living testaments to the power of motherly love.
Berlin, 1931: Ally Keller, a talented young poet, is alone and scared when she gives birth to a mixed-race daughter she names Lilith. As the Nazis rise to power, Ally knows she must keep her baby in the shadows to protect her against Hitler's deadly ideology of Aryan purity. But as she grows, it becomes more and more difficult to keep Lilith hidden so Ally sets in motion a dangerous and desperate plan to send her daughter across the ocean to safety.
Havana, 1958: Now an adult, Lilith has few memories of her mother or her childhood in Germany. Besides, she's too excited for her future with her beloved Martin, a Cuban pilot with strong ties to the Batista government. But as the flames of revolution ignite, Lilith and her newborn daughter, Nadine, find themselves at a terrifying crossroads.
Berlin, 1988: As a scientist in Berlin, Nadine is dedicated to ensuring the dignity of the remains of all those who were murdered by the Nazis. Yet she has spent her entire lifetime avoiding the truth about her own family's history. It takes her daughter, Luna, to encourage Nadine to uncover the truth about the choices her mother and grandmother made to ensure the survival of their children. And it will fall to Luna to come to terms with a shocking betrayal that changes everything she thought she knew about her family's past.
Separated by time but united by sacrifice, four women embark on journeys of self-discovery and find themselves to be living testaments to the power of motherly love.
Editorial Reviews
"A stunning multigenerational story…the taut pacing keeps the pages flying. Readers will be deeply moved." -Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Praise for The German Girl
"Fascinating . . . a brilliant entrée into the souls, terrors, ardors, endeavors and hopeless valor of people who have been written off. . . . Now, in a new age of people in peril and adrift on the world's seas, this magnificent novel-and the unexpected and intricate tragedies of its powerfully imagined characters-bespeaks this eternal injustice." -- Thomas Keneally, Bestselling author of Schindler's List
"An unforgettable and resplendent novel which will take its place among the great historical fiction written about World War II. Hannah Rosenthal will remain in your heart and her determination to tell the story of what she saw, lived, and lost will change the way you look at the world." -- Adriana Trigiani, bestselling author of The Shoemaker's Wife
"A timely must-read." ― People
Praise for The Daughter's Tale
"[The Daughter's Tale is] better written and more tightly edited than most books in this genre, and the story line is breathtakingly threaded together from start to finish with the sound of a beating heart. Or more to the point, the silence between the heartbeats. Correa's prose is atmospheric, but what's most fascinating about this novel is his portrayal of terrified yet strong female characters who anticipate future trials and methodically work through them. Amanda knows that each decision she makes will have an impact on the next, but her goal is always survival." ― New York Times Book Review
Praise for The German Girl
"Fascinating . . . a brilliant entrée into the souls, terrors, ardors, endeavors and hopeless valor of people who have been written off. . . . Now, in a new age of people in peril and adrift on the world's seas, this magnificent novel-and the unexpected and intricate tragedies of its powerfully imagined characters-bespeaks this eternal injustice." -- Thomas Keneally, Bestselling author of Schindler's List
"An unforgettable and resplendent novel which will take its place among the great historical fiction written about World War II. Hannah Rosenthal will remain in your heart and her determination to tell the story of what she saw, lived, and lost will change the way you look at the world." -- Adriana Trigiani, bestselling author of The Shoemaker's Wife
"A timely must-read." ― People
Praise for The Daughter's Tale
"[The Daughter's Tale is] better written and more tightly edited than most books in this genre, and the story line is breathtakingly threaded together from start to finish with the sound of a beating heart. Or more to the point, the silence between the heartbeats. Correa's prose is atmospheric, but what's most fascinating about this novel is his portrayal of terrified yet strong female characters who anticipate future trials and methodically work through them. Amanda knows that each decision she makes will have an impact on the next, but her goal is always survival." ― New York Times Book Review
Short Excerpt Teaser
Chapter One: Berlin, March 1931 1 Berlin, March 1931
The night Lilith was born, winter storms raged in the midst of spring.
Windows closed. Curtains drawn. Ally Keller writhed in pain on the damp sheets. The midwife clutched Ally's ankles.
"This time it's coming."
After the contraction, the very last one, her life would change. Marcus, Ally thought. She wanted to cry out his name.
Marcus couldn't answer her. He was far away. The only contact they had now was the occasional letter. Ally had started to forget his scent. Even his face had faded into darkness for a moment. She looked down at herself on the bed as though she were some other woman, as though the body in labor wasn't her own.
"Marcus," she said aloud, her mind increasingly restless.
After everything they'd been through together, after all they'd said and shared, Marcus had become a shadow to her. Their child would grow up without a father. Perhaps her father had never really wanted her after all. Perhaps this was always meant to be her daughter's destiny. What right did she have to interfere?
The night Lilith was born, Ally thought of her own mother. She couldn't recall a single lullaby, an embrace, a kiss. She had spent her childhood surrounded by tutors, perfecting her handwriting and use of language, learning new vocabulary words and proper grammatical constructions. Numbers were a nightmare, science was dull, and geography left her disoriented. All she cared about was escaping into the make-believe stories that led her on journeys back in time.
"Join us in the real world, would you?" her mother would say. "Life isn't a fairy tale."
Her mother let her go her own way. She had sensed what Ally's life would be, and how powerless she was to stop it. Given the direction Germany was heading, she knew that her rebellious, headstrong daughter was a lost cause. With hindsight, Ally could see her mother had been right all along.
"You're falling asleep." The midwife's agitated voice interrupted her thoughts, her hands stained with a yellowish liquid. "You need to concentrate if you want to get this over with."
The midwife was seasoned: she could boast of the requisite nine hundred hours of training, had helped deliver more than one hundred babies.
"Not a single dead baby, not one. Nor a mother either, not one," she had told Ally when she took her on.
"She's one of the best," the agency had assured her.
"One day we'll enact a law to make sure that all babies born in our country are delivered by a German midwife," the woman at the agency had added, raising her voice. "Purity upon purity."
Perhaps I should have found one with no experience, no idea how to bring a baby into the world, Ally thought.
"Look at me!" the midwife snapped. "Unless you do your bit, I can't do my job properly. You're going to make me look bad."
Ally began to tremble. The midwife seemed to be in a hurry. Ally thought she might have another pregnant woman waiting for her. She couldn't stop thinking that this woman's fingers, her hands were inside her, delving around. Saving one life while destroying another.
The night Lilith was born, Ally tried to imagine herself back in the apartment on the riverbank with Marcus: the two of them, hidden in the moonlight, making plans for life as a family, as if such a thing were possible. The morning light always took them by surprise. Caught unawares, they began closing windows and drawing curtains to stay in the dark they'd made their haven.
"We should run away," she once said to Marcus, while they were lying curled up in bed.
She waited for his response in silence, knowing that for Marcus there could only be one answer. Nobody could convince him otherwise.
"If things are bad for us here, in America it would only be worse," he would say. "Every day that goes by, more people see us as the enemy."
To Ally, Marcus's fear was abstract. It lay in hidden forces, like a gathering wave they couldn't see, but that would one day, apparently, drown them all. So she chose to ignore Marcus's forebodings and those of his artist friends; she was hopeful that the storm would pass. Marcus had dreams of working in movies. He had already appeared in one film, in a minor role as a musician, and he had said she should go with him to Paris where he hoped to be cast in another. But then she became pregnant and everything changed.
Her parents were beside themselves. They sent her to live in their empty apartment in Mitte, in the center of Berlin, to hide their shame. They told her that it was the last thing they'd do f...
The night Lilith was born, winter storms raged in the midst of spring.
Windows closed. Curtains drawn. Ally Keller writhed in pain on the damp sheets. The midwife clutched Ally's ankles.
"This time it's coming."
After the contraction, the very last one, her life would change. Marcus, Ally thought. She wanted to cry out his name.
Marcus couldn't answer her. He was far away. The only contact they had now was the occasional letter. Ally had started to forget his scent. Even his face had faded into darkness for a moment. She looked down at herself on the bed as though she were some other woman, as though the body in labor wasn't her own.
"Marcus," she said aloud, her mind increasingly restless.
After everything they'd been through together, after all they'd said and shared, Marcus had become a shadow to her. Their child would grow up without a father. Perhaps her father had never really wanted her after all. Perhaps this was always meant to be her daughter's destiny. What right did she have to interfere?
The night Lilith was born, Ally thought of her own mother. She couldn't recall a single lullaby, an embrace, a kiss. She had spent her childhood surrounded by tutors, perfecting her handwriting and use of language, learning new vocabulary words and proper grammatical constructions. Numbers were a nightmare, science was dull, and geography left her disoriented. All she cared about was escaping into the make-believe stories that led her on journeys back in time.
"Join us in the real world, would you?" her mother would say. "Life isn't a fairy tale."
Her mother let her go her own way. She had sensed what Ally's life would be, and how powerless she was to stop it. Given the direction Germany was heading, she knew that her rebellious, headstrong daughter was a lost cause. With hindsight, Ally could see her mother had been right all along.
"You're falling asleep." The midwife's agitated voice interrupted her thoughts, her hands stained with a yellowish liquid. "You need to concentrate if you want to get this over with."
The midwife was seasoned: she could boast of the requisite nine hundred hours of training, had helped deliver more than one hundred babies.
"Not a single dead baby, not one. Nor a mother either, not one," she had told Ally when she took her on.
"She's one of the best," the agency had assured her.
"One day we'll enact a law to make sure that all babies born in our country are delivered by a German midwife," the woman at the agency had added, raising her voice. "Purity upon purity."
Perhaps I should have found one with no experience, no idea how to bring a baby into the world, Ally thought.
"Look at me!" the midwife snapped. "Unless you do your bit, I can't do my job properly. You're going to make me look bad."
Ally began to tremble. The midwife seemed to be in a hurry. Ally thought she might have another pregnant woman waiting for her. She couldn't stop thinking that this woman's fingers, her hands were inside her, delving around. Saving one life while destroying another.
The night Lilith was born, Ally tried to imagine herself back in the apartment on the riverbank with Marcus: the two of them, hidden in the moonlight, making plans for life as a family, as if such a thing were possible. The morning light always took them by surprise. Caught unawares, they began closing windows and drawing curtains to stay in the dark they'd made their haven.
"We should run away," she once said to Marcus, while they were lying curled up in bed.
She waited for his response in silence, knowing that for Marcus there could only be one answer. Nobody could convince him otherwise.
"If things are bad for us here, in America it would only be worse," he would say. "Every day that goes by, more people see us as the enemy."
To Ally, Marcus's fear was abstract. It lay in hidden forces, like a gathering wave they couldn't see, but that would one day, apparently, drown them all. So she chose to ignore Marcus's forebodings and those of his artist friends; she was hopeful that the storm would pass. Marcus had dreams of working in movies. He had already appeared in one film, in a minor role as a musician, and he had said she should go with him to Paris where he hoped to be cast in another. But then she became pregnant and everything changed.
Her parents were beside themselves. They sent her to live in their empty apartment in Mitte, in the center of Berlin, to hide their shame. They told her that it was the last thing they'd do f...
