Review by Booklist Review
It's August 1961, and the Berlin Wall is being hastily erected. In a moment of panic, Monica Voekler hands her four-year-old daughter, Luisa, over the barbed wire and into her grandparents' arms. Monica is stopped as she tries to follow, and the family is torn apart, leaving Monica and Luisa's father, Harris, a newspaperman who promotes Communism, bereft in Berlin. Luisa moves to America with her grandparents and is told that her parents were killed in an automobile crash. More than 25 years later, Luisa, who works for the CIA decoding ciphers, is asked to help interpret some letters from Berlin, letters that jog her memories of her grandfather. In a search of her childhood home, Luisa finds a stash of letters written between her father and grandfather spanning two decades. Her family, it seems, is based on secrets, and Luisa uses her skills to uncover the tracks and discover the truth. Parallel plots involving Harris, beginning in 1950s Berlin, and Luisa in 1980s Washington, DC, gradually converge until they collide in a nail-biting climax. Fans of codebreakers, spies, and Cold War dramas will be entrapped by Reay's tale of courage, love, and honor set against the rise and fall of the Berlin Wall.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
