The World War Two Orphanage: Book 1
Publication Date: August 15, 2024
Munich, 1943. My heart breaks as I watch the smug couple carry the tiny bundle into their sinister black limousine. Carefully I write the baby’s name into my secret notebook. No matter the danger, I will do everything I can to reunite him with his mother…
As the darkest shadows of the war spread, nurse Margarete Weiss is sent away to work in a mother and baby home in a beautiful corner of the German countryside. As she approaches the fairy-tale castle with manicured grounds and fair-haired young women laughing in the sunshine, she imagines she will be helping to create a haven for young German mothers to have their children. But when she discovers what is really going on inside the castle walls, she knows she needs to do whatever she can to put a stop to the horror she witnesses, even if it means risking her own life…
Italy, 2005. 90-year-old Margarete sits in her chair in her care home, her hands trembling as she looks into the face of the young reporter, Kristel, sitting in front of her. Kristel’s bright blue eyes and intelligent smile are so familiar, and as Kristel explains she is here to talk to her about the children taken from their mothers during the war, Margarete knows her faded blue notebook with its list of names might hold the answers that Kristel needs.
But as Margarete shares the names with Kristel, her heart beats fast inside her chest. She knows that sharing the truth about those terrible days is the right thing to do, but it also shines a spotlight on her own painful secrets. The notebook will provide Kristel and Margarete with answers… But at what price? And can the two women help each other find the peace they so badly need?
An absolutely heart-breaking and page-turning WW2 novel of one woman’s courage in a time of unimaginable darkness. Fans of The Alice Network, Before We Were Yours and The Nightingale will get lost in the pages of this incredible story.
Unlike many historical fiction novels set in World War II that focus on the persecution of Jews and the concentration camps, The Orphan List explores the Nazi effort to breed a “master race” of Aryans.
Using this as a foundation, author Ann Bennett delivers a heartbreaking story of a German nurse forced to participate in the Lebensborn program. Margarete was sent to a maternity home in Bavaria to ostensibly help women and care for babies, but in reality, it was a breeding experiment.
The story uses time-shifting chapters to deliver present-day events of 2005 in contrast with events beginning in 1933. Margarete tells her story to a reporter in an effort to help reunite mothers and babies separated by the program.
The story also features a young woman named Hedda who arrives at the Bavarian maternity home expecting that the father of her child, an SS officer, will marry her. Instead, he encourages her to provide a baby for the Reich.
The two storylines intersect in a powerful revelation packed with emotion. More than anything, though, the story underscores the atrocities that the Germans suffered under Nazi control.
The Orphan List illustrates the contributions brave Germans made to document the injustices of separating mothers and babies.
Ann Bennett writes historical fiction, mainly about the second world war in South East Asia. Her writing was originally inspired by researching her father’s experience as prisoner of war of the Japanese on the Thai-Burma Railway. Her books include Bamboo Heart: A Daughter’s Quest, Bamboo Island: The Planter’s Wife, Bamboo Road: The Homecoming, A Daughter’s Promise, The Tea Planter’s Club, The Amulet and The Fortune Teller of Kathmandu. Together they make up the Echoes of Empire collection. She has also written The Lake Pavilion, The Lake Palace, The Lake Pagoda and The Lake Villa (the Oriental Lake Collection). The Orphan House, The Runaway Sisters, The Child Without a Home and The Forgotten Children are published by Bookouture.
