by Faris Cassell
author of The Unanswered Letter, winner of the Jewish Book Club award
As stars faded from a clear night sky over Amsterdam in the early hours of Friday, May 10, 1940, a sound like rolling thunder jolted twenty-six-year-old Ilse Hess from her troubled sleep. She had feared that this moment, known it was coming.
For weeks, hour after frightening hour, she and her husband, Karl, had listened to the news on their wireless: Wehrmacht troops are massing at the border. German tanks and trucks are gathering. Dutch defenses throughout the Netherlands are prepared.
The thin hope she had held for her family’s safety from the Nazis collapsed as the roar grew louder, shook the floor in their small apartment, rattled the dishes. . . .
Inseparable is the vivid account of one family’s struggle to survive the Holocaust. It is the story of Ilse and Karl Hess and their twin children, refugees from Germany, who found themselves trapped in The Netherlands.
Above all, this is the unforgettable story of a young mother and father who were willing to sacrifice everything for their children.