Reviewed by Emma Crowley
“If you ever get lost, Jacob, you need to stay where you are and wait, because I’ll come looking for you. And I’ll always find you.”
In the icy grip of winter, Emma is trying to escape Poland, with her two young children and little more than the clothes on their backs. With the Russian Red Army advancing, she knows their safety relies on them crossing the border. She swears to herself that she’ll do whatever it takes to keep their family together.
But before they can reach the border, her little boy Jacob falls ill, his once-sparkling blue eyes getting dimmer with each moment that passes. And Emma knows she has to get him to a hospital, where she hands him to a kind nurse.
She feels sure they will be reunited the next day. But then the bombing starts. And when she reaches the hospital again, she finds it deserted, her darling son gone.
Though her heart tells her she has to stay and find him, she faces an impossible choice. She would risk her own life for Jacob in a heartbeat, but as her daughter Sophie’s cold, little hand slips into her own, Emma is forced to make a heartbreaking decision. Unable to find any trace of her beloved son, she knows she must at least get her daughter to safety.
But she can never forget the promise she made to her little boy. That if they were ever separated, she’d come looking for him. That she’d always find him.
Whatever the danger, whatever the risk. She knows what she has to do. Because there is nothing stronger than a mother’s love…
Many thanks to Bookouture via NetGalley for my copy of The Orphan’s Mother to review and to Sharon for having my review on the blog.
The Orphan’s Mother by Marion Kummerow is a story packed full of emotion, heartbreak, sacrifice, questions and a horrible dilemma. What do you do when faced with the toughest decision you will ever make in your life? Is choosing one child over another the right thing to do? What happens when said decision has deep impacting consequences that change the course of the person involved life forever? When faced with a decision that must be made in a split instant how do you know that you have made the right one? Can you live with what you have done knowing the outcome may not be as a positive one? This is a story that focuses on two families during the later part of World War Two. Both are different in their construction, but they are families none the less and the themes of love, sacrifice, courage and remorse all feature heavily throughout.
There was no messing about with a long-winded unnecessary introduction instead we got to the heart of the story straightaway and the book was all the better for it. The story is set in Poland and alternates between Emma and Irena. Emma’s husband Herbert is away fighting the Russians. Her family are of German origin and live in the city of Lodz and she has two young children Sophie aged 7 and Jacob aged four. Irena is Polish and a nurse on a children’s ward in the city of Posen and married to a doctor named Luka. War has torn their lives apart but they are about to be tested even more as the Russians advance further throughout Poland. For Irena it means her city will be freed from German control but for Emma her home place is about to be overrun and what potentially could occur doesn’t even bear thinking about.
Both women face many challenges and tough decisions. Decisions that need to be made in the spur of the moment but the ramifications of which will be felt for many years to come. Faith, hope and love will sustain the main characters through the most desperate of times but a mothers love for her child will always shine through. Emma makes the decision to leave Lodz with a small group for she knows to stay will spell the worst fate for her little family. They travel through the harsh Polish winter but as they do so Jacob becomes dangerously ill. The scenes on the trek were so vividly described. The cold biting air that meant every layer of clothing one possessed had to be worn. The strength required to pull the carts holding their meagre possessions. The hunger and bone-weary tiredness but yet the hope that once they reach Posen they will be able to get a train which will take them to Germany. People of German origin had looked down on the native Poles viewing them as an inferior race with little intellect but now the tables have turned and the Poles are rearing up and desperately hoping the Russians reach them quickly so they can recoup their freedom. But war is an ugly thing and as they reach the city Jacob is very ill.
Emma was an amazing mother. She kept going against a wave of obstacles with her goals planted firmly in her sight - to get her children to safety, to reunite with her husband and to survive the war. But all is not as she would have wished and Posen is no longer safe. The Germans resident in the city and the incoming refugees are ordered to evacuate. As she tried to make it to the hospital where she left Jacob to receive help she battles against a wave of people. She is under pressure, time is running out and the German soldiers are fierce in their insistence that everyone moves forward not backward. Emma is faced with the toughest decision she has ever had to make. Does she go against orders and make it to get Jacob or does she consider Sophie and get to the train that is evacuating people?
I don’t know how she made such a decision and I’m sure that although this is a work of fiction many women could possibly have been facing the same choice due to various circumstances. I don’t think it was a case of Emma choosing one child over another and she knows she will have to live with the aftermath of her decision. She has to keep faith that as she boards the train to leave that someone may have sheltered Jacob. For surely he would not have been left in the hospital all alone as the Russians drew ever closer? She’ll get Sophie to safety and come back for Jacob. After all she has told Jacob to never run away or try to find her but to stay in the same place and she will come looking for him. She clings to this belief as her story takes on several twists and turns. It was an utterly heart-breaking thing for Emma to have to do and you couldn’t even contemplate what you would do if you were in the same situation.
On the opposite side of the coin is Irena who has suffered a great loss that eats away at her daily. She has never been the same woman and although she works diligently on the children’s ward at night she goes home and cries herself to sleep. Irena is from a totally different background to Emma but their love of children is a common bond that ties them together. What was really good about this book is that a well rounded viewpoint was offered regarding both situations that develop. It made the reader stop and think and not be too judgemental. For both women make incredible sacrifices that come with so much risk and danger. It highlighted how in times of war people will do things that never thought themselves capable of. They become selfless in their actions.
I’ll admit within the first few chapters I could sense where the threads of the story were going but not the actual specific details. Subsequently, when Irena makes a quick judgement her strength of character can’t be denied. She takes in Jacob not knowing anything of his family history and not being able to communicate with him due to them speaking different languages. What she has done may seem foolhardy and rash to some and if the authorities discovered his true heritage the results do not even bear contemplation. But it shows what bravery and courage she had and Luka too. I loved that we got to see Jacob’s point of view with regard to everything he was experiencing. He feels abandoned and that his mother never loved him. He is to blame for the situation they found themselves in and for getting ill. The innocence of a four year old comes through and your heart breaks for him as it really does for everyone involved. For I believe, there was no right or wrong choice for you must do what you feel is right at that very moment. There wasn’t time to think long term only to think immediate survival is of the utmost importance.
The story developed very well in the later half of the book and the reader is constantly thinking about things and asking oneself what would you do in the same situation? Things weren’t clear cut at all and you questioned whether Jacob would ever be reunited with his family. But a lot of water flows under the bridge and I loved the exploration of the situation in Europe post war and how things didn’t go back to normal for quite some time. Does Jacob make it back to his family? But who are his family? How do experiences mould and shape us? Does unconditional love win through? How can we repair ourselves after trauma, loss and horror? To discover the answers to all these questions and many more I suggest you grab yourself a copy of The Orphan’s Mother. It’s well worth a read.
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