Prague Fraud
For years, I felt like a “Prague Fraud.” After all, Diamonds in Auschwitz reads in part as a love letter to Prague—a city whose beauty, history, and resilience inspired so much of the novel—yet I had never actually been there. Thanks to my incredible book club friends, that finally changed. Walking the streets that inspired Hanna, Samual, and Rachael, crossing Charles Bridge, and visiting the sites woven into the story brought the novel to life in a way I never expected. More than a year after publication, Prague reminded me why I fell in love with this story in the first place—and confirmed that some literary journeys are worth taking twice.
Why Historical Fiction?
Why do I write what I write? Why historical fiction? I write it because it needs to be written. I recently visited the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington DC. I wanted to go specifically for one small exhibit – the children’s artwork from Terezin, the Jewish ghetto outside of Prague. As I expected, it moved me, made me even more committed to telling the story of those children who were (mostly) all sent straight to the gas chamber. I feel like I’m helping to protect and preserve those stories.