Rainy Day Reads

This is a piece of historical fiction set against the background of the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff,   a ship carrying over 10,000 refugees, wounded soldiers and crew. The ship set out from Gotenhafen, now known as Gdynia, in present-day Poland at the end of January 1945. At the time the city was under German control and it was used as a naval base. At the end of the war it became a corralling point for refugees trying to escape the advancing Russian army and gain passage on a ship to safety.   In this story we follow four young people, each with their own motives and secrets. We have Alfred, the young German soldier, who believes in Hitler’s cause insofar as it doesn’t interrupt his plans for himself, Florian the Prussian who is enacting a scheme of revenge, Joana, a young Lithuanian woman who feels guilty for the people lost to the war and Emilia, a Polish girl who has gotten lost in the mire of war.  The four of them meet up on the road to Gotenhaf...