Cuckoo Clock – New York by Elisabeth Marrion
Follow up to ‘Liverpool Connection: Annie’s Story’ Kristallnacht 9 November 1938. Doctor Esther Rosenthal’s husband has just enough time to whisper to her before the SA pulls him out of the door and slams it shut behind him. Esther has to leave Germany in a hurry and embarks on a journey taking her through Holland,…
Follow up to ‘Liverpool Connection: Annie’s Story’
Kristallnacht 9 November 1938. Doctor Esther Rosenthal’s husband has just enough time to whisper to her before the SA pulls him out of the door and slams it shut behind him.
Esther has to leave Germany in a hurry and embarks on a journey taking her through Holland, England, and ultimately to the USA.
In Holland she meets a group of children from a Berlin orphanage, the first children to go to England on the Kindertransport. Together with her father Mordechai she joins them on their crossing and accompanies them to Harwich.
The Kindertransport comes to an abrupt end on the outbreak of World War II. What will happen to the children still in Harwich without a new permanent or foster home?
‘Cuckoo Clock – New York: Esther’s Story’, is the third book in the Unbroken Bonds series.
“A strong finish to an outstanding trilogy about WWII”
Five Star Review on Amazon By LINDA A. ROOT
The poignant third segment in Elisabeth Marrion’s semi-biographical trilogy about WWII as seen through the eyes of ordinary people is as beautifully told as the first segments.In Cuckoo Clock-New York, the protagonist Esther Rosenthal is a Jewish doctor whose husband is detained before most Jews sense the growing danger of a Germany ruled by Nazis. In the course of their flight to England, they fall in with a group of children, most of whom are also Jewish. Doctor Rosenthal adopts three of the neediest. As the title implies, some of the action takes place in the United States. However, most of the action occurs in war-ravaged rural England while the Battle of Britain rages. Esther’s father Mordecai is a clockmaker who had smuggled an example of his handiwork out of Germany in his luggage. He uses the gold weights from a cuckoo clock to finance the needs of the growing family. When tragedy strikes a family member, Esther, who is living with her father in New York City, must return to England. It is the first of her two trips from the United States to Europe in hopes of learning the fate of someone she loves. The book is populated by a strong supporting case, many of them children, and each with a story to tell. It is a compelling, fast-moving story that I read in a single all-night reading session–a story of challenge and solidarity that makes it more than a war story. The writing is excellent and easily read. The characters are believable, and the ending, hopeful. I am a huge fan of Elisabeth Marrion and look forward to her future books. I was not solicited to read and review this book, but I am acquainted with the author through our membership in the English Historical Fiction Authors group. I am delighted to be the first to review it.
About the Author
Elisabeth was born in August 1948, in Hildesheim, Lower Saxony, Germany.
Legend has it that the town is over 1000 years old. Its symbol being a rose and one of the towns famous places to visit is the Cathedral with its 1000 years old wild rosebush.
Elisabeth’s mother was German and her father British, a Corporal in the Royal Air Force, stationed after the War in the Bristish occupied zone in Germany.
Elisabeth, pictured right, got her love for the theatre from her mother, both were in performing arts at their local theatres from a young age.
As a teenager she enjoyed reading novels and plays by Oscar Wilde, Thornton Wilder and never lost her love of reading novels by Ernest Hemingway, plus short stories by Guy de Maupassant. More recently she felt inspired by ‘ Rabbit-Proof Fence’ a true story told by Doris Pilkington.
In 1969 she moved to England where she met her husband David from Liverpool. Together they established a clothing importing company.
Their business gave them opportunities to work in the Sub Continent and the Far East spending many years travelling to Bangladesh, where they helped their Manufacturer to establish a school in the rural part of the country.
For inspiration, Elisabeth puts on her running shoes for a run on the coastal path, in the New Forest where they now live.