The Last Train to London: A Novel

Front Cover
HarperCollins Publishers, 2019 - Fiction - 451 pages
"In 1936, the Nazis are little more than loud, brutish bores to fifteen-year old Stephan Neuman, the son of a wealthy and influential Jewish family and budding playwright whose playground extends from Vienna's streets to its intricate underground tunnels. Stephan's best friend and companion is the brilliant Žofie-Helene, a Christian girl whose mother edits a progressive, anti-Nazi newspaper. But the two adolescents' carefree innocence is shattered when the Nazis' take control. There is hope in the darkness, though. Truus Wijsmuller, a member of the Dutch resistance, risks her life smuggling Jewish children out of Nazi Germany to the nations that will take them. It is a mission that becomes even more dangerous after the Anschluss - Hitler's annexation of Austria - as, across Europe, countries close their borders to the growing number of refugees desperate to escape. Tante Truus, as she is known, is determined to save as many children as she can. After Britain passes a measure to take in at-risk child refugees from the German Reich, she dares to approach Adolf Eichmann, the man who would later help devise the "Final Solution to the Jewish Question," in a race against time to bring children like Stephan, his young brother Walter, and Žofie-Helene on a perilous journey to an uncertain future abroad."--Publisher description.

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About the author (2019)

Meg Waite Clayton is an American author, and a graduate of the University of Michigan Law School. She has written for the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, The Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Runner's World and public radio, frequently on the particular challenges that women face. Her first novel, The Language of Light, was a finalist for the Bellwether Prize for Socially Engaged Fiction (now the PEN/Bellwether). She has also written The Race for Paris, The Wednesday Daughters, The Four Ms. Bradwells, and The Wednesday Sisters.