Falling Uphill

Famine, sickness, and chaos ravaged the lost empire at war's end. Martha was five. Her father was the doctor in the village he'd turned into a vacation resort for residents of nearby Vienna. Her mother was the dentist. Th eir professional duties and a dark family secret shadowed her childhood. Her father's mind had sunk into madness. She was pushed into marriage too young because of his illness. Her husband, Karl, was a college professor. Her new home was in Eisenstadt, the city of Haydn, not in the ghetto but surrounded by soon-to-be Nazis. In 1938, her world changed overnight. Swastika flags fluttered in early spring breezes. Karl lost his job. Hitler Youth stood guard at the doors of their house. Evil and death fi lled the air. Seven months pregnant with her younger child, she obtained three scarce American visas. She, Karl, and their four-year-old daughter, Ilse, sailed to New York on a German ship. They arrived penniless. On the day the ship docked, she broke her arm. Ilse was sent to Detroit in the care of an aunt, a stranger to her. Her past vanished into an instant of shock. Shattered identity can be assembled again. It's called falling uphill.