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A story of courage in the face of evil. The tense drama of Suzanne Spaak who risked and gave her life to save hundreds of Jewish children from deportation from Nazi Paris to Auschwitz. This is one of the untold stories of the Holocaust.Suzanne Spaak was born into the Belgian Catholic elite and married into the country's leading political family. Her brother-in-law was the Foreign Minister and her husband Claude was a playwright and patron of the painter Rene Magritte. In Paris in the late 1930s her friendship with a Polish Jewish refugee led her to her life's purpose. When France fell and the Nazis occupied Paris, she joined the Resistance. She used her fortune and social status to enlist allies among wealthy Parisians and church groups. Under the eyes of the Gestapo, Suzanne and women from the Jewish and Christian resistance groups "kidnapped" hundreds of Jewish children to save them from the gas chambers. In the final year of the Occupation Suzanne was caught in the Gestapo dragnet that was pursuing a Soviet agent she had aided. She was executed shortly before the liberation of Paris. Suzanne Spaak is honored in Israel as one of the Righteous Among Nations.



About the Author

Anne Nelson

Anne Nelson is an award-winning author and playwright who has written extensively about human rights and the defiance of totalitarian regimes. Her most recent work is "Shadow Network: Media, Money, and the Secret Hub of the Radical Right." Her previous book, "Suzanne's Children: A Daring Rescue in Nazi Paris", a finalist for the National Jewish Book Award, was published in eight countries. "Red Orchestra: The Story of the Berlin Underground and the Circle of Friends Who Resisted Hitler" (2009) was named Editor's Choice by the New York Times Book Review. She is also the author of "Murder Under Two Flags: The US, Puerto Rico, and the Cerro Maravilla Cover-up."Her play "The Guys," which premiered in 2001 with Sigourney Weaver and Bill Murray, has been produced in all 50 states and 15 countries. Her screenplay of "The Guys" was produced as a feature film starring Sigourney Weaver and Anthony LaPaglia. Her play "Savages," an exploration of military occupation, was described by the New Yorker as a work of "lacerating beauty." Nelson's writing has been published in The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Harper's, and she has appeared on CBS "Sunday Morning" and The PBS "Newshour," as well as the BBC, CBC and NPR. She has received the Livingston Award for International Journalism, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a Bellagio Fellowship. Nelson is a graduate of Yale University and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. She is a research fellow at the Columbia School of International and Public Affairs in New York City.Nelson lectures frequently on human rights, authoritarian regimes, and the role of the media. She is represented by Ethan Bassoff of the Ross Yoon Agency, and Authors Unbound speaker agency.



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