A blind spot in many families: the continuing impact of the Holocaust and the Second World War. A fascinating study of the generational trauma of war – and why families are finally beginning to talk.
DER BLINDE FLECK
(The Blind Spot)
by Stephan Lebert & Louis Lewitan
Heyne/PRH Germany, April 2025
It’s been 80 years since the Holocaust and the end of the Second World War, and only few eye witnesses are still alive. Yet the effects of the past persist. Shaped by a dark age that was over before they were even born, generations are suffering from a trauma whose cause they don’t fully understand: loved ones who show little emotion, feelings of guilt, fear, loneliness, a sense of rootlessness. Many families suffer from a leaden silence – suppressed memories, well-kept secrets, lies that won’t go away. It is an oppressive legacy, whose poison circulates to this day.
But now the armour of silence is starting to show cracks. Since ever fewer of them need to fear confrontation with parents or grandparents, they are beginning to investigate their family histories, hoping to discover how they have influenced their own lives. With DER BLINDE FLECK, trauma and stress expert Lewitan and award-winning journalist Lebert have created a unique book on the both difficult and freeing experience of finally facing up to the burden that is your family history. Based on deeply moving conversations with those affected, it is a highly topical contribution to memorial literature.
Stephan Lebert, born in Munich in 1961, is an award-winning journalist. Following spells at the Süddeutsche Zeitung, Spiegel and Tagesspiegel, he is now special projects editor at Die Zeit. He most recently won the 2022 Theodor Wolff Prize, and is the author of Denn du trägst meinen Namen (‘Because you have my name’, 2000), about the descendants of leading Nazis.
Louis Lewitan, born in Lyon in 1955, is a psychologist and a renowned stress and trauma expert with international expertise, thanks to a period spent in New York as researcher and executive director at the International Study of Organized Persecution of Children. Elie Wiesel was the group’s honorary president, and its focus was on the delayed effects of the Shoah on child survivors. Lewitan is the author of several books and was interviewed by Zeit magazine for its ‘How I was saved’ series.
Germany, 1901. Domestic servant Lissi has embarked on a foolish affair with the scion of the family she works for. But her hopes of a romantic wedding are shattered, and when she finds herself pregnant, alone and desperate, she decides to leave her home town. Meanwhile, Julia Varrell has been lured into an arranged marriage under false pretences, and feels lonely on her husband’s idyllic estate. She, too, wants out. And so Lissi and Julia find themselves on board a ship bound for New York.
Book 1: A MILLION STARS ABOVE (
Book 2: A THOUSAND FLAMES BELOW (March 2025)
When Melanie’s fiancé has an accident and ends up in a coma, young Melanie fears for his life, and for their future. After weeks of desperation and paralysis, she seeks refuge and distraction on her 96-year-old great-grandmother Hanna’s estate. In the attic of the manor house, she discovers a Vietnamese fairy tale – and then Hanna tells her about her eventful past: how she grew up in Vietnam as the daughter of a wealthy family, and how she met her ‘jasmine sister’ Tanh, a girl born into poverty. As Melanie listens, fascinated, her great-grandmother regales her with tales of adventure among temples and rice fields, and the story of an extraordinary friendship between two girls separated by a fateful event. But Melanie finds solace not only in Hanna’s memories and unshakeable zest for life, but also in the company of widower Thomas, who looks after the manor’s gardens. And suddenly, she feels a little spark of hope stirring in her heart…
Karlskrona, Sweden, 1910. Liv feels constricted – and not just by the corset she puts on every day. Her loveless marriage to shipowner Sten Boregard, too, is stifling her. Her desire for freedom grows stronger when she meets Marlene, a sailor’s widow, who has been ostracised by the other sailors’ wives ever since her husband and his crew died on the high seas. But Marlene won’t let anyone bring her down, and Liv is impressed by her free spirit and energy. The pair become close friends, and when Liv unexpectedly inherits a rose-covered gamekeeper’s cottage in the woods, she and Marlene boldly decide to create a refuge where women can fulfil their true potential. They secretly breathe new life into ‘Rosenhag’ and its wildflower garden – but little do they know that not only their secret, but they themselves, are in grave danger…