Blue Skies Over Berlin by John Steinberg
A
young German woman, thinking she can escape her memories of wartime
Berlin, moves to London in 1954 under her new name of Charlotte
Brown. The offer of a prestigious job at the National Gallery leads
her to believe that she can establish a new life in a city itself
emerging from the ruins of war.
With
her new identity, Charlotte hopes she has left Eva Schlessinger far
behind . . . but when her job brings her into contact with a ruthless
set of art dealers with dubious wartime connections, she fears they
can see behind her facade. Priceless masterpieces start appearing at
auction, stolen from murdered Jewish families by the Nazis, and she
herself is implicated. At this point, Charlotte makes a solemn
promise – one that will take her a lifetime to fulfil.
Blue
Skies Over Berlin is
a novel about secrets and guilt in an uncertain time, balanced by
friendship and enduring love - and ultimately the need to make amends
for just standing by.
Born
and raised in North London in 1952, John still lives in the city with
his wife and three children. Privately educated, John left school
after ‘A’ levels and completed a business diploma in what is now
the University of Westminster, before entering banking.
He
started training as an accountant but did not complete the course,
choosing a position in his family’s furniture manufacturing
business instead. John started his own mergers and acquisitions
business in 1987, which he ran for almost 20 years before quitting to
become a full time writer in 2007.
John
has co-written and produced comedies for the stage and has created a
series of books for children. “Previously,
I had only been interested in comedy and finally started to write
down the things I said or thought of. That led me to co-write and
produce a play, In the Balance, and then W for Banker – which
appeared at the New End Theatre, Hampstead. It was then I decided to
quit the world of business in favour of writing full-time, and move
toward more serious subjects. My first novel has taken two years to
write and is the first in a series of books I am calling the
‘Steinberg Stories’.”
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