It was a JOY to talk to Elizabeth Millane about Sixty Blades of Grass—an important novel that is based on her own family history. It is set during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands during World War II,
Elizabeth Millane was born in Michigan, but during visits to her family in Holland, she discovered the role of her family in the Dutch Resistance.. How did they survive under the watchful eye of the Nazi regime? What sacrifices did they have to make?
Sixty Blades of Grass is the story of Rika, a 17-year old painter, who is asked to record the movement of the trains the Germans were using to transport Jews out of the country. It’s a dangerous assignment. If she is caught she would be executed. Taking her paints and canvas to the fields near the railyard, she devises a way to paint in code. A way to make a lasting record.
But it’s not just the Germans Rika has to fear. There are traitors to fear—and some might be in her own family.
I have spent a great deal of time visiting battlefields across Europe. So I appreciate how Elizabeth Millane captures those dark days during the war when German troops devastated the country in their quest to occupy Europe. The last days of the war were absolutely devastating to the Dutch.
An amazing debut for a very talented author who has written a compelling story. With what is happening in Europe today, it is also a relevant story.I?a’
About the book:
The bond between a Dutch teenager and her father is tested as the Resistance wages its secret war against the Nazis, in this suspenseful and emotional novel.
During the Second World War, Rika, a seventeen-year-old Dutch Resistance fighter, paints in fields overlooking the busy rail yards. Hidden in her artwork is information crucial to the Dutch Underground about the concentration camps and Jewish prisoner transports.
But Rika’s covert activities aren’t the only thing on her mind. In these uncertain times, even trusting family is risky. She suspects her father of collaborating with the Germans and is determined to uncover the truth.
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Praise for Elizabeth Millane
“Sixty Blades of Grass is a darkly lyrical homage to bravery and love in occupied Holland during WW2, a story grounded by its roots in the author’s family saga. In a vigorous first person narrative and in diary pages, the young painter heroine and her best friend come up hard against the evil forces of destruction around them. Through her work for the Resistance, the painter comes to have dire suspicions of her collaborator father until they too are separated. An action filled plot keeps pages turning from Amsterdam and the Hague to the death camps. A fine addition to Holocaust and World War 2 literature.” —Mary Glickman, author of By the Rivers of Babylon and other award-winning novels
“An intriguing and dramatic, yet personal, story about the Dutch resistance during the Second World War. Elizabeth Millane captures the intensity and relentless danger experienced by those courageous enough to surreptitiously battle the Nazi occupation of Holland in any way that was possible. Risking their lives, it was impossible for the resisters to know who to trust—even for a young woman who is uncertain where her father’s true loyalties lie.” —Allan Levine, author of Fugitives of the Forest
