Monique Charlesworth – författare

A heartrending coming-of-age novel set in a war-torn Europe, The Children’s War is subtle and romantic literary fiction at its best.A young girl sits alone in a station waiting room in Marseilles. Part Jewish, Ilse has been sent out of Nazi Germany to safety in Morocco by her mother. This is the beginning of an uneasy life, shifting across borders, blown by circumstances beyond her control. Fleeing through France as the Nazis invade, she is thrown in the path of an intense young soldier, François, in whom darkness and light seem inextricably mixed.Inside Germany, a boy struggles with his destiny in the Hitler Youth. Nicolai is a reluctant warrior. Despite the comfort of his Hamburg home, he comes to feel that he is a stranger in his own land. As war steals their youth away, both Ilse and Nicolai search for love in a time of terror. Subtle in its depiction of people and worlds now vanished, this epic novel of occupation and war powerfully evokes the battles behind enemy lines, those of home and of heart.

In 1939 a young girl sits alone in a station waiting room in Marseilles. Half-Jewish Ilse has been sent out of Nazi Germany to safety in Morocco by her mother. But her journey takes her back to France, where she cannot escape the Nazi occupation. Blown about by circumstances beyond her control, she must grow up alone in a demi-monde of refugees, whores and freedom fighters.In Germany, Nicolai struggles against his destiny in the Hitler Youth. His only comfort is the friendship of Ilse’s mother, who works as a nanny in his affluent household.The war eats up their youth. Though hope grows in France, a dark tableau is unfolding in Germany, and this reluctant soldier and the brave young girl must fight for their survival.

Shortlisted for the Times Literary Supplement Ackerley Prize 2024A true story of the passionate and tragi-comic relationship between a mother running from her past in Hitler’s Germany and a daughter running towards it.Inge was German, half-Jewish and a Holocaust survivor, all of which she chose to deny until the very end. Talented and able, charismatic and infuriating, she surged through life constantly reinventing herself. Sent out of Nazi Germany to the souks of Meknés, she fled a freezing attic in war-torn Brussels to land in a council estate in Birkenhead. London offered the escapee a new start until her past caught up with her. Triumph finally came in France where nobody knew who she was – least of all the friends who adored her.Led by emotions she could barely understand, let alone control, Inge divided, and often she conquered. After her death, deep secrets emerged.  Her daughters knew that she had always misled others – but not that they, too, might be collateral damage.Compelling, frank, and witty, this memoir is part detective story, part daughterly fury. Drawn to embrace the identity her mother could not bear, Monique Charlesworth has dug deep into Inge’s story, unveiling tragedy, passion, heartbreak and, finally, the truth.