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Red Anemone

כלנית אדומה

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 Secrets My Mother Never Told

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A novel inspired by a true story forthcoming in 2025

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​​What happens when we discover we aren’t the person we thought we were?

 

       "Red Anemone" chronicles Natalie Barlow’s journey of self-discovery that begins when her mother’s death, bursts open a Pandora’s box of family secrets going back to pre-WWII Germany. As Natalie navigates the complexities of her newly discovered Jewish identity, she comes face to face with the early 20th-century German immigrant experience, the deep antisemitism and anti-German sentiment that prevailed across America, and the effect this had on generations of her own family.

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      Moving among generations of a German-American family, “Red Anemone” is a poignant exploration of:

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• Family legacy: The intricate bonds that tie us to our ancestors, the secrets they hold, and to the families we love and who love us.

• Cultural and Personal identity: The challenges of weaving newly revealed family heritage into personal aspirations and a new cultural identity that threatens existing, deeply cherished family relationships.

• Loss and gain: The enduring power of family history to reshape our lives, causing us to reject some long-held assumptions about ourselves and our families and embrace a new, uniquely different future.

• Resilience and determination to thrive even in the harshest conditions, just as the red anemone, Israel's national flower, symbolizes.

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