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Start giftingThis Terrible Beauty
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Learn moreFrom the bestselling author of The Forgotten Hours comes an unforgettable story of one woman’s journey to reclaim what she lost in a country torn apart by the devastating legacy of WWII.
On the windswept shores of an East German island, Bettina Heilstrom struggles to build a life from the ashes. World War II has ended, and her country is torn apart. Longing for a family, she marries Werner, an older bureaucrat who adores her. But after joining the fledgling secret police, he is drawn deep into its dark mission and becomes a dangerous man.
When Bettina falls in love with an idealistic young renegade, Werner discovers her infidelity and forces her to make a terrible choice: spend her life in prison or leave her home forever. Either way she loses both her lover and child.
Ten years later, Bettina has reinvented herself as a celebrated photographer in Chicago, but she’s never stopped yearning for the baby she left behind. Surprised by an unexpected visitor from her past, she resolves to return to her ravaged homeland to reclaim her daughter and uncover her beloved’s fate, whatever the cost.
Katrin Schumann is the author of the Washington Post and Amazon Charts bestseller The Forgotten Hours. Born in Freiburg, Germany, she lives in Boston and Key West. She is the program coordinator for the Key West Literary Seminar, teaches at GrubStreet in Boston, and was an instructor in PEN’s Prison Writing Program. Katrin has been granted numerous fiction residencies and is the author of several nonfiction books. Her work has been featured on Today and Talk of the Nation and in the London Times, among others. She studied languages at Oxford and journalism at Stanford. For more information and to sign up for her newsletter, go to www.katrinschumann.com.
Reviews
“Lyrically written, fantastic worldbuilding…It’s about forgiveness, as three people who have all made mistakes struggle to do what is right in the end for the innocent. This book will stay with me a long time.” —Kate Quinn, New York Times bestselling author of historical fiction
“A compelling and richly layered story of love, motherhood, art, and ultimately self-preservation—this is a vivid, rapidly paced historical novel. Unputdownable!” —Jillian Cantor, USA Today bestselling author of The Lost Letter and In Another Time
“Schumann’s vivid focus reveals characters who crumble with heartbreak and rise with strength, and above all draws her readers in and never lets them go.” —Rachel Barenbaum, bestselling author of A Bend in the Stars
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