John Boyne
Paperback
384 pages
From the author of the globally bestselling, multi-million-copy classic, The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, comes its astonishing and powerful sequel. Gretel Fernsby is a quiet woman leading a quiet life.
She doesn't talk about her escape from Germany seventy years ago or the dark post-war years in France with her mother. Most of all, she doesn't talk about her father, the commandant of one of the most notorious Nazi concentration camps. But when a young family moves into the apartment below her, Gretel can't help but befriend their little boy, Henry, though his presence brings back painful memories.
One night, she witnesses a violent argument between his parents, which threatens to disturb her hard-won peace. For the second time in her life, Gretel is given the chance to save a young boy. To do so would allay her guilt, grief and remorse, but it will also force her to reveal her true identity.
Will she make a different choice this time, whatever the cost to herself?