Spanish Edition People Magazine Editor ARMANDO LUCAS CORREA writers his first novel - the New York Times Bestseller THE GERMAN GIRL

Chris Rice Cooper 

caccoop@aol.com

https://www.facebook.com/christalann.ricecooper

*The images in this specific piece are granted copyright privilege by:  Public Domain, CCSAL, GNU Free Documentation Licenses, Fair Use Under The United States Copyright Law, or given copyright privilege by the copyright holder which is identified beneath the individual photo.

**Some of the links will have to be copied and then posted in your search engine in order to pull up properly

The German Girl

By Armando Lucas Correa

www.ArmandoLucasCorrea.com

“The Convergence of 12-year old Anna from New York City and 83-Year old Hannah in Cuba”

Most people assume Jewish girl Hannah Rosenthal is the perfect specimen of Hitler’s ideal German girl:  blonde hair, blue eyes, porcelain skin. This gives Hannah the freedom to roam Berlin’s streets with her best friend and confident Leo without being afraid of the “Ogres,” Hannah’s term for the Nazis.  

 

In March of 1939 a photographer from Das Deutsche Madel makes the same assumption, takes her photograph, and places her on its March 1939 issue cover. Hannah assumes the photographer is an “Ogre” who knows her secret and runs away. 

She forgets about the incident until days later when she returns home shocked to see Das Deutsche Madel, a publication she knows her father despises, on the family dinner table.                              

Papa paused and looked up.  Now he was staring at me.  He turned the magazine over and pushed it toward me with suppressed rage.

Two months later on May 13, 1939, Hannah and her parents along with Leo and his family board the St. Louis (Right) in Hamburg, Germany; their destination, Cuba.  

A total of 937 Jewish refuges seeking asylum from Nazi Germany board the St. Louis; and finally on May 27, 1939 at 4 a.m. they reach their destination Cuba only to be told by the Cuban President Federico Laredo Bru (Left) that Cuba has changed its mind and will not give asylum to the 937 passengers.

In the end only 28 passengers, 22 of them Jewish, were allowed to leave the St. Louis and enter Cuba.  Hannah Rosenthal, 12, and her mother are two of the 22 Jewish passengers allowed entry into Cuba. 

       Hannah and her pregnant mother whom she sometimes calls the Goddess, leave behind Hannah’s beloved best friend Leo and her father on the St Louis and embark on a new life in Cuba residing in a house in Vedado.  (Left - Home in Vedado)

       It was a solid two-story house that was quite modest in comparison with the mansion next door, which occupied a plot twice the size of ours. . . .

       It is in this house that Hannah will live, always dreaming of moving to New York where she could be an American and free.  

       The German Girl is Armando Lucas Correa’s first novel http://www.armandolucascorrea.com, translated from Spanish to English by Nick Caistor https://www.facebook.com/nick.caistor, published in hardcover on October 18, 2016 and in softcover on September 21, 2017 by Atria Books http://atria-books.com.

The German Girl tells the story of two 12-year old girls Hannah and Anna.  Hannah’s story begins in 1939 in Berlin (Left) at age 12 and continues well into her old age. 

       Anna’s story begins in 2014 in New York City where she lives in an apartment complex with her mother, who has been in a deep depression since Anna’s father died on that fateful day of September 11, 2001. 

Both Anna and her mother deal with her father’s death in different ways – her mother is unable to function, seeking solace in her own bed of gray sheets and gray pillows near a window that has a view of the courtyard. (Left attributed to Rachael Westbrook at  http://bipolarcaregivers.org)

From the day I discovered what had really happened to Dad, and Mom understood I could fend for myself she shut herself in her bedroom and I became her caretaker. 

Anna has never met her father – her mother was pregnant with her when 9/11 happened.  Her most treasure possession is her favorite photograph of her father that she keeps at her nightstand next to her bed.  She describes her father as the most handsome man ever with black hair, dark eyes, and black eyebrows.  She finds her father mysterious in the photo, especially since he is wearing rimless glass and has a hint of a smile on his face.   

       I go into my bedroom to tell all the day’s events to Dad, who is waiting on my beside table.

       Then one day Anna goes about her regular routine, she gets up, serves her mother breakfast in bed, attends school, comes back to check the mail, and goes back to their apartment.  This specific day is different – in the mail is a yellow, white, and red striped package from Canada, originating from Cuba.  Anna makes her mother get out of bed and look at the package. 

       When she sees the sender’s name, she picks up the envelope and clutches it to her chest.  Her eyes open wide and say says to me solemnly.      

“It’s from your father’s family.”

       There is an envelope inside and it is the March 1939 issue of Das Deutsche Madel with a blonde, blue eyed girl on the cover.

       “The German Girl,” says Mom, translating the title from the magazine.  “She looks like you,” she tells me mysteriously.

      

Anna learns about her father Louis, her grandfather the Cuban Revolutionary Gustavo Rosenthal; and more importantly about her grandfather’s sister and her great-aunt Anna Rosenthal. And through this learning she claims an identity that is German, Cuban, English, and Jewish; and more importantly she finds a peace within herself about her father, and about herself – she may be only 12 but she is on the cusp of becoming a woman that her great aunt Hannah had always dreamed of becoming. 

Hannah finally meets the only the person on this whole earth who shares her DNA, Anna.  She falls in love with Anna and finds the courage to open the mysterious package Leo gave her back in 1939.  It is having a relationship with her great-niece Anna and the contents of Leo’s package that enable Hannah to finally claim a full and complete identity at the age of 87. (Above Right attributed to Johannes Antonie Smith)