The Book of Lost Names

By: Kristin Harmel

Narrated by: Madeleine Maby

“A fascinating, heartrending page-turner that, like the real-life forgers who inspired the novel, should never be forgotten.” —Kristina McMorris, New York Times bestselling author of Sold on a Monday

Inspired by an astonishing true story from World War II, a young woman with a talent for forgery helps hundreds of Jewish children flee the Nazis in this “sweeping and magnificent” (Fiona Davis, bestselling author of The Lions of Fifth Avenue) historical novel from the #1 international bestselling author of The Winemaker’s Wife.

Eva Traube Abrams, a semi-retired librarian in Florida, is shelving books when her eyes lock on a photograph in the New York Times. She freezes; it’s an image of a book she hasn’t seen in more than sixty years—a book she recognizes as The Book of Lost Names.

The accompanying article discusses the looting of libraries by the Nazis across Europe during World War II—an experience Eva remembers well—and the search to reunite people with the texts taken from them so long ago. The book in the photograph, an eighteenth-century religious text thought to have been taken from France in the waning days of the war, is one of the most fascinating cases. Now housed in Berlin’s Zentral- und Landesbibliothek library, it appears to contain some sort of code, but researchers don’t know where it came from—or what the code means. Only Eva holds the answer, but does she have the strength to revisit old memories?

As a graduate student in 1942, Eva was forced to flee Paris and find refuge in a small mountain town in the Free Zone, where she began forging identity documents for Jewish children fleeing to neutral Switzerland. But erasing people comes with a price, and along with a mysterious, handsome forger named Rémy, Eva decides she must find a way to preserve the real names of the children who are too young to remember who they really are. The records they keep in The Book of Lost Names will become even more vital when the resistance cell they work for is betrayed and Rémy disappears.

An engaging and evocative novel reminiscent of The Lost Girls of Paris and The Alice Network, The Book of Lost Names is a testament to the resilience of the human spirit and the power of bravery and love in the face of evil.

Excellent book!

Absolutely Loved this book. It brought me back to my own mother-in-law and her stories during the war.

The Book of Lost Names

I enjoyed this book and at times there was just the right of suspense and romance. The author brought out each character’s personality. I recommend the book to all those who like historical fiction based on real life situations.

Great book, terrible narration

Loved the book. Like all of her books, she tells history in a compelling way.
Main character a bit too naive, and her mother unbearable.
I found the narration awful, I had to try very hard not to let it ruin the book for me

another excellent novel based on WWII

loved the storyline and characters during the French Resistance and hardships and the hope of Jewish children being saved by the book of names

Book started slowly but builds.

Enjoyed the book very much it builds slowly. Ending is unexpected but very satisfying. Narration is good .