Tears of Amber

by Sofía Segovia

On this visit, they would even forget the lure of the fruit-shaped Schwermer marzipan they’d tried on that rare occasion when their father had had money, time, and a good mood all at once.

If at the age of four Ilse was only beginning to understand a family’s love, how could Wanda explain the hatred between enemies to her daughter’s young soul?

Then her grandmother had caught her telling Freddy about Papa being the bull and Mama the cow . . . and Ilse’s freedom to discover nature abruptly ended.

For the eastern front was execution in a slow, roundabout way, the victim waiting to stop a projectile with his body.

Did you know that Heine wrote that where books are burned, it always ends in people being burned?”

He

followed the compass in his feet, all the way to the Hahlbrocks’ farm.