A soldier goes missing two days before the Armistice ends World War I.
A decorated pilot encrypts his account of a failed diamond deal.
A national police officer is executed on the order of Joseph Stalin.
An industrialist loses everything he helped build, first in part to the Nazis, then totally to the Communists.
A shopkeeper is arrested by the Gestapo and both he and his wife spend years in a forced labor camp and their sons are put in foster care.
A civil servant hires a genealogist to prove German ancestry, changes his birth record, and dies in the rubble of the Third Reich.
They were brothers.
This true story is an exploration of one family's experience in a time of violence, displacement, and repression. The author reveals how eugenics and tribalism shaped immigration and citizenship laws in the U.S. and Germany in the twentieth century, and how a generation was affected by the rampant ethnic nationalism of the time.
"Well written, exhaustively researched, and a beautiful compilation of a family's lost collective history." - Readers' Favorite
"Well written, exhaustively researched, and a beautiful compilation of a family's lost collective history." - Readers' Favorite
"A well-researched and sentimental memoir [that] details the way oppressive structures have altered the identity of millions of families. Lost Roots has equal parts nostalgic storytelling and detailed research, providing beguiling context for what's happening in Poland, Germany, and America. I was completely enthralled until the very last word."
-Independent Book Review
"Lost Roots...is a non-fiction book that reads like fiction. It features excellent prose, captivating commentaries, and a conflict that transports readers to the post-WWI era." -The Book Commentary