The Lorelei

by Fred Strickert

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1591293723
• ISBN13: 9781591293729
• Release Date: July 2002
• Publisher: Publish America
• Length: 408 Pages
• Weight: 1.33 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 5.9" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

A story behind "The Story"

This is really two stories: one based on as many facts as possible and "filled in" with fiction where there are gaps, and the other a narrative of the author's point of view as the facts of his own mother's and grandparent's lives are revealed to him after long being kept in secrecy. I found myself cheering for the author when another piece of the puzzle was added, when another segment of his own personal history came into view. I also found myself compelled by the story of the novel's main characters: a native Rhineland maid called away from home to serve as a nanny, an American soldier serving in the Army of Occupation in Germany after the end of the first World War, and the chain of events that led to the birth of a daughter... the author's own mother. For 405 pages, I was captivated. This is a very easy read. The sense of storytelling is smooth and emotive, the inclusion of the author's own tale of his discovery is also a wise addition to the novel. The technique in this book compares with the investigative storytelling of Jon Krakauer in his book "Into The Wild." There are also some issues that might prove worthy of discussion after reading this book, I would recommend it for book clubs or discussion groups. There is an interesting characterization and humanization of times when one nation's military (lots of single young men) serves as an occupation force in a recently war-torn country (usually filled with an abundance of single young women or widows with small children). We know about American soldiers fathering children during their service in Viet Nam, Korea, Japan, and we are familiar with the stories of their children. Many Germans fled their own country in the wake of a madman transforming citizens and local resources into a massive war machine, bent on "cleansing" the world. This is a meaningful story during a time of unprecedented numbers of native Afghanis, Chechnyans, Serbs, and Palestinians seeking assylum of their own in other countries due to the madness in their own societies.To read this book is to look into a part of the past that many of us today have only read about. How important to our own time is it to notice that lives are unalteringly affected by war, and governments bent on enforcing their own set of values in other parts of the world?