Code Edelweiss by Stephanie Landsem ~ Book Review

 

As a single parent, Liesl Weiss is the only financial supporter in her household which includes herself, her 2 children, her mother and her unhelpful brother.  When she loses her secretarial job at MGM studios she desperately searches for another.  When she sees a job opening for a secretary for a local lawyer, Liesel grabs the info going straight over to Leon Lewis' office.  Unfortunately Leon Lewis doesn't want to offer her the secretarial job in his office but instead, going with his instincts, offers Liesel as job to spy on a organization called Friends of New Germany and her own neighborhood of Germantown for his spy network.  With her blonde Aryan looks Liesel would fit right in.  As a Jewish lawyer, Lewis has watched Adolf Hitler rise to power and now sees an increasing amount of anti-semitism right in his city of Los Angeles.  He believes there are plans in the works to take over Hollywood for the use of the Nazi's propoganda in America.  Of German descent, Liesel can't quite believe any of the rumors she has heard concerning Germany's new chancellor and especially does not believe what Leon Lewis is suggesting and that this New Friends of Germany would have anything to do with the Nazis.  But desperate to provide for her family she takes the job which sets her into the offices of the organization.  As Liesl starts to spend her days listening and observing, in horror she starts to realize what Leon Lewis feared most is not a rumor at all but a well executed plan already under way.  Now realizing the danger she is in, Liesl must decide whether she is up for being a part of stopping this dangerous group.

This was a great read.  Based on true events, it is the story of the work of Leon Lewis, a lone Jewish lawyer, and a handful of amatuer spies which he set in place that discovered the plans of the Nazi Germany to take over the control of Hollywood and rid Los Angeles of the Jewish community.  I've never read this aspect of pre-WWII and it was very interesting.  The characters were well written and the book was a page turner as events are rushing towards the de Angriff (the attack).   I loved the character development of Liesl, who at the start of the book was a confused and hurt woman just trying to make it through each day, one who was trying to fit into her German neighborhood and do right by her children, who at first took the job because she had to provide for her family  but who became a courageous woman of conviction who moved beyond her fears to do what she had to do to stop the hatred she finally saw.  In asking herself "If not me, then who?  And if not now, when?"  she took on a role that she never imagined herself to be in.  The story challenges us to do the same, if maybe not in quite the same way as Liesl, then in whatever way we can.  

I rated this a 9.5/10

2023 Reading Challenge Goal Met:  At least one library book a month from my library list