The Book of Lost Names

About the book

Eva Traube Abrams, a retired librarian living in Florida, is organizing books when she notices a photo in the New York Times. She stops; it’s a picture of a book she hasn’t seen in over sixty years - a book she knows as The Book of Lost Names.

The article discusses the theft of books by the Nazis throughout Europe during World War II - an ordeal Eva recalls vividly - and the effort to return the stolen texts to their rightful owners. The book in the photo, an old religious text believed to have been taken from France towards the end of the war, is a particularly intriguing case. Currently held in Berlin’s Zentral- und Landesbibliothek library, it appears to have a hidden code, but researchers are unsure of its origin - or its meaning. Only Eva possesses the key, but does she have the courage to confront her past?

As a student in 1942, Eva had to flee Paris and seek shelter in a small town in the Free Zone, where she began forging IDs for Jewish children making their way to neutral Switzerland. However, erasing identities comes at a cost, and with the help of a charming forger named Rémy, Eva resolves to find a way to safeguard the real identities of the children who may not remember who they are. The information stored in The Book of Lost Names becomes crucial when the resistance group they work with is betrayed and Rémy vanishes.

A captivating and poignant novel reminiscent of The Lost Girls of Paris and The Alice Network, The Book of Lost Names celebrates the strength of the human spirit and the courage and love needed to combat evil.