The Cut Out Girl: A Story of War and Family, Lost and Found: The Costa Book of the Year 2018

Description

A harrowing true story about a young girl's struggle to survive Nazi persecution, and a man's attempt to unveil his family's secrets The last time Lien saw her parents was in the Hague, where she was collected at the door by a stranger and taken away to be hidden from the Nazis. She was raised by her foster family as one of their own, but a falling out after the war put an end of to their relationship. What was her side of the story, Bart van Es - a grandson of the couple who looked after Lien - wondered? What really happened during the war, and after? So began an investigation that would consume and transform both Bart's life and Lien's. This is an astonishing portrait of a young girl's struggle to survive war, and her powerful, tumultuous and painful ties with her foster family.

Bart van Es was born in the Netherlands and is bilingual in English and Dutch. He now lives with his family in England. He is a Professor of English Literature at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of St Catherine's College.

Astonishing. Van Es has created a masterpiece of history and memoir, concluding on a note of reconciliation, hope and great love * Evening Standard * An extraordinary, harrowing story of loss, survival and love * Guardian * Deeply moving, this is a remarkable memoir * Sunday Times * Powerful . . . extraordinary * Irish Times * Brought to life with family photographs and diary entries that add further impact to Lien's harrowing memories and testimony - this deeply affecting and fascinating story is guaranteed to haunt you * Sunday Mirror * Remarkable - the story of one traumatic childhood, deeply moving, and told with great dexterity, allowing the wisdoms of today to run parallel with the absorbing narrative of wartime events * Penelope Lively * Compassionate and thoughtfully rendered, the book is both a memorable portrait of a remarkable woman and a testament to the healing power of understanding. A complex and uplifting tale * Kirkus * A nuanced, moving, and unusual "hidden child" account * Publishers Weekly * Superb. This is a necessary book - painful, harrowing, tragic, but also uplifting * The Times Book of the Week * Fascinating, beautifully written. Van Es carefully salvages Lien's story and creates a deeply moving and complex book about war, atrocity and human suffering * The Oldie * Sensational and gripping . . . shedding light on some of the most urgent issues of our time * Judges of the Costa Book of the Year Prize 2018 * Luminous, elegant, haunting - I read it straight through * Philippe Sands, Author of East West Street * Deeply moving. Writes with an almost Sebaldian simplicity and understatement * Guardian * Harrowing and beautiful * Bookseller * An awe-inspiring account of the tragedies and triumphs within the world of the Holocaust's "hide-away" children, and of the families who sheltered them * Georgia Hunter, author of We Were the Lucky Ones * The Cut Out Girl is a reminder of the extraordinary richness of archives and the treasures released by scholarly research * TLS * An extraordinary story, harrowing, deeply affecting. This fascinating story is guaranteed to haunt you * People * A moving story of personal and family history, with a scholar's objective eye for the bigger picture. * Irish Times * Harrowing . . . profoundly moving * Daily Express *