The Forest of Vanishing Stars by Kristin Harmel
World War II Historical Fiction, 384 pages
Published July 6th 2021 by Gallery Books
The New York Times bestselling author of the The Book of Lost Names returns with an evocative coming-of-age World War II story about a young woman who uses her knowledge of the wilderness to help Jewish refugees escape the Nazis—until a secret from her past threatens everything.
After being stolen from her wealthy German parents and raised in the unforgiving wilderness of eastern Europe, a young woman finds herself alone in 1941 after her kidnapper dies. Her solitary existence is interrupted, however, when she happens upon a group of Jews fleeing the Nazi terror. Stunned to learn what’s happening in the outside world, she vows to teach the group all she can about surviving in the forest—and in turn, they teach her some surprising lessons about opening her heart after years of isolation. But when she is betrayed and escapes into a German-occupied village, her past and present come together in a shocking collision that could change everything.
Inspired by incredible true stories of survival against staggering odds, and suffused with the journey-from-the-wilderness elements that made Where the Crawdads Sing a worldwide phenomenon, The Forest of Vanishing Stars is a heart-wrenching and suspenseful novel.
(I love to note the first lines of the books I'm reading. First lines can really grab a reader's attention and I love seeing where the author takes the reader after their first line.)
First line—"1922: The old woman watched from the shadows outside Behaimstrasse 72, waiting for the lights inside to blink out."
I actually read this book when it first came out and am just now sharing my thoughts about it. As soon as I reread the synopsis, I was immediately dropped back into this amazing, unforgettable story.
It seems like I have been reading a lot of books set in the time of World War 2 lately. The characters and the storyline in The Forest of Vanishing Stars gives that time a different spin from other books I've read, featuring the point of view of a woman who has learned to survive alone in the wilderness. As she gets close to civilization again and discovers what's happening in the world around her, she is able to educate and save some of the refugees she encounters.
The Forest of Vanishing Stars is a unique, very enjoyable look at a horrible time in history, a story that will give you hope that there is still good in the world. I highly recommend it for all historical fiction readers.
I received an ARC of The Forest of Vanishing Stars via NetGalley and this is my honest opinion.
About the author
Kristin Harmel is the New York Times bestselling and #1 international bestselling author of The Book of Lost Names, The Winemaker's Wife, and a dozen other novels that have been translated into numerous languages and sold all over the world.
A former reporter for People magazine, Kristin has been writing professionally since the age of 16, when she began her career as a sportswriter, covering Major League Baseball and NHL hockey for a local magazine in Tampa Bay, Florida in the late 1990s. After stints covering health and lifestyle for American Baby, Men’s Health, and Woman’s Day, she became a reporter for People and spent more than a decade working for the publication, covering everything from the Super Bowl to high-profile murders to celebrity interviews with the likes of Ben Affleck, Matthew McConaughey, OutKast, Justin Timberlake, and Patrick Dempsey. Her favorite stories at People, however, were the “Heroes Among Us” features—tales of ordinary people doing extraordinary things. One of those features—the story of Holocaust-survivor-turned-philanthropist Henri Landwirth (whom both Walter Cronkite and John Glenn told Kristin was the most amazing person they’d ever known)—partially inspired Kristin’s 2012 novel, The Sweetness of Forgetting, which was a bestseller all over the world.
In addition to a long magazine writing career (which also included articles published in Travel + Leisure, Glamour, Ladies’ Home Journal, Every Day with Rachael Ray, and more), Kristin was also a frequent contributor to the national television morning show The Daily Buzz—where her assignments included flying to London three times to interview the cast of the Harry Potter films. She has appeared on Good Morning America and numerous local television morning shows--and even stumbled into a role as an extra in the 2003 American Idol movie while awaiting an interview with Kelly Clarkson.
Kristin was born just outside Boston, Massachusetts and spent her childhood there, as well as in Columbus, Ohio, and St. Petersburg, Florida. After graduating with a degree in journalism (with a minor in Spanish) from the University of Florida, she spent time living in Paris and Los Angeles and now lives in Orlando, with her husband and young son. She travels frequently to France for book research (and—let’s be honest—for the pastries and wine) and writes a book a year for Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster. ~ Goodreads
