Books and Brunch with Armando Lucas Correa

Photo credit: Girl Well Read and Simon & Schuster Canada.  Do not use without written permission.

Blue Heron Books hosted "Books and Brunch" featuring Armando Lucas. The event was moderated by Susanna Kearsley, who asked Armando about his writing process, inspiration, and themes of his latest work. A question and answer period, as well as a book signing, followed.

2016’s The German Girl looks into the lives of the passengers of the MS Saint Louis. The Daughter’s Tale continues that story, but this time, is about the passengers who ended up back in France. It also brings to light another act of savagery—which is often excluded from the historical record—the massacre at Oradour-sur-Glane. In June 1944, 642 of the village inhabitants, including women and children, were killed by a German Waffen-SS company. Many of whom were burned alive inside the local Catholic church.

Both novels have ties to Cuba and begin with the MS Saint Louis. During World War II, the Motorschiff St. Louis was a German ocean liner carrying more than 900 Jewish refugees. The ship was denied permission to land in Cuba and only 28 passengers were allowed to disembark. The ship travelled to both the United States and Canada in the efforts of trying to find a nation that would take the Jews in—both countries refused. Captain Schröder returned to Europe where various countries (the UK, Belgium, the Netherlands, and France) accepted some of the refugees. Many were subsequently caught in Nazi roundups of Jews in occupied countries, and historians have estimated that approximately a quarter of them died in death camps. Correa was a part of the formal apology from Canada's Prime Minister. Justin Trudeau, who on behalf of the government of Canada, apologized to the German Jews aboard the Saint Louis, their families, and to those who paid the price of Canada's inaction.

Correa grew up in Cuba. He remembers being 10-years-old and his grandmother saying that "Cuba would pay very dearly for what it had done to the Jewish refugees." When he was older, he understood that she was referring to the Saint Louis tragedy, something which is never spoken of in Cuba. His grandmother was the daughter of Spanish immigrants and when the Saint Louis arrived in the port of Havana on May 27, 1939, she was pregnant with his mother. Correa's grandmother was deeply impacted seeing how the majority of the refugees aboard were forced to return to Europe, and ultimately faced their deaths in the Nazi concentration camps.

The research took ten years—he began when he was a student in Havana. Upon his arrival in the United States, he acquired books, documents, postcards, and photos related to the Saint Louis, including the autographed diary of the ship’s captain. He spoke of the time when he interviewed a Canadian survivor. She had all of her mementos hidden away in a box and didn't speak of it, her family didn't even know.

His writing process

Correa writes at his home in upstate New York between the hours of 9 p.m. to 2 a.m., or on the weekend. He feels that the creative process comes from subconsciousness, and when you are close to sleep. Oftentimes he will read to trigger his writing. His books are written in his native Spanish where he is conscious of how his words will translate. Working with a translator takes another year.

What's next?

There will be a third book, The Night Traveller, which will tackle Nazi Germany’s eugenics. This will conclude the Holocaust cycle.

The Daughter's Tale

BERLIN, 1939. The dreams that Amanda Sternberg and her husband, Julius, had for their daughters are shattered when the Nazis descend on Berlin, burning down their beloved family bookshop and sending Julius to a concentration camp. Desperate to save her children, Amanda flees toward the south of France, where the widow of an old friend of her husband’s has agreed to take her in. Along the way, a refugee ship headed for Cuba offers another chance at escape and there, at the dock, Amanda is forced to make an impossible choice that will haunt her for the rest of her life. Once in Haute-Vienne, her brief respite is inter­rupted by the arrival of Nazi forces, and Amanda finds herself in a labor camp where she must once again make a heroic sacrifice.

NEW YORK, 2015. Eighty-year-old Elise Duval receives a call from a woman bearing messages from a time and country that she forced herself to forget. A French Catholic who arrived in New York after World War II, Elise is shocked to discover that the letters were from her mother, written in German during the war. Despite Elise’s best efforts to stave off her past, seven decades of secrets begin to unravel.

Based on true events, The Daughter’s Tale chronicles one of the most harrowing atrocities perpetrated by the Nazis during the war. Heartbreaking and immersive, it is a beautifully crafted family saga of love, survival, and redemption.

ARMANDO LUCAS CORREA is an award-winning journalist, editor, author, and the recipient of several awards from the National Association of Hispanic Publications and the Society of Professional Journalism. He is the author of the international bestseller The German Girl, which is now being published in thirteen languages.

Correa lives in New York City with his partner and their three children.