Book Beginning: Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly

Lilac Girls, a novel by Martha Hall Kelly,  released April 5, 2016 by Ballantine Books
A story told by three women caught up in WWII whose lives collide as the war rages on: 

• New York socialite Caroline Ferriday working at the French consulate until Hitler invades Poland and sets his sights on France; 
• Kasia Kuzmerick, a teenager and courier for the resistance movement in Poland; 
• Herta Oberheuser, a young German doctor trapped in a government medical position. 

Here are their first chapters:
Caroline, September 1939 - Chapter 1

If I'd known I was about to meet the man who'd shatter me like bone china on terra cotta, I would have slept in. 

Kasia, 1939 - Chapter 2

It really was Pietrik Bakoski's idea to go up to the bluff at Deer Meadow to see the refugees. Just want to set straight the record. Matka never did believe me about that. 

Herta, 1939 - Chapter 3

At midnight, father and I walked six blocks from our basement apartment to a nicer part of Dusseldorf, to the white stone townhomes where servants swept the streets and pinched back geraniums in window boxes. It was late September, but the air was warm still, "fuhrer weather" they called it, since it permitted Hitler success in his campaigns. It had certainly worked with Poland.

Page 56:
Caroline

"Since Washington changed immigration quotas in '24, everything's harder now," Roger said.

The book is based on the life of Caroline Ferriday, one of many "forgotten" heroes of the war. Looks like a book I'll enjoy reading. 

The Friday 56. Grab a book, turn to page 56 or 56% of your eReader. Find any sentence that grabs you. Post it, and add your URL post in Linky at Freda's Voice.

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