The Last Train

In July, 1944, one of the last convoys of deportees took three days, in blazing heat, to go from Compigne to Dachau. More than 2,000 men were crowded into 22 cars, and more than 500 would die on the journey.

Arnaud Rykner's The Last Train, winner of the Jean d'Heurs prize for historical fiction upon its initial release in France, and which is here beautifully translated into English for the first time by Sue Boswell, is based on this historical fact, which was experienced by a member of his family. This short novel, presented as a monologue of the protagonist as he nears his 22nd birthday, is at once a chronicle of a true hell, and a compelling meditation on survival.