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The End of Sorrow

Category:  Historical Fiction
Publisher: WingSpan Press
ISBN-10:  1595941657
Type: Fiction
Pages: 404
Copyright: June 22, 2007
ISBN-13: 9781595941657


Less than three months after Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941, Hitler’s forces completed their planned encirclement of Russia’s second largest city – Leningrad (known today as Saint Petersburg). Hitler vowed to wipe the city from the face of the earth through continual bombardment and by cutting off all outside supplies. He publicly boasted the city would starve to death and German forces would march into a ghost town.

History tells us otherwise. For 900 days, the people of Leningrad endured the siege. One out of two would die from the cold, the starvation, or the endless bombs that rained down. Washington, DC author JV Love tells their stories in the historical novel, "The End of Sorrow" (978-1595941657, Trade paperback, 404 pp, 6 x 9, $21.95 – also available as an eBook for $8.99 from www.Mobipocket.com).

Though playing a significant role in the ultimate Allied victory in WWII, Love found that few Americans knew of the siege. "90% of people I talked to had never heard of it," he says. "Everyone had heard of Stalingrad, but I always thought the situation in Leningrad was even more compelling – that an entire city never gave in despite the incredible odds is extremely moving."

Based on true events and rounded out with some real-life characters, "The End of Sorrow" takes readers on a journey through Leningrad under siege and the brutal Eastern Front of 1941-42. From the Partisans (Soviet men and women who fought behind enemy lines) to the city’s inhabitants, nothing short of immense human will got them through the difficult times. During one of the harshest Leningrad winters on record, the German Luftwaffe bombed the city’s central food warehouse. Leningrad soon ran out of food, leading to rampant starvation. The siege would be broken briefly through the Road of Life – a temporary road built on a frozen lake.

Gripping and dramatic, "The End of Sorrow" offers rich and compelling history while asking some very deep questions. For more information or to contact the author, please visit www.EndOfSorrow.com.
 

Excerpt
"The snow underneath him turning red and the cold so intense that it was difficult to breathe, Felix waited. In his mind, he disappeared from the cold, and reappeared in that warm, familiar place where the sun refused to set, where the lazy afternoons went on forever, and where the shade of a tree was proof of God’s unconditional love. In that peaceful place, he lay on the soft grass, Katya beside him – her outstretched forearm resting lightly on his bare chest. When he kissed the small of her wrist, the tender scent of lilacs and honey stayed on his lips. He listened as she recited in his ear a poem she had written for him, the final words of it repeating themselves in his mind: Love is the beginning, and Love is the end, and here in the middle is where we must mend.

It was all so real – that bright yellow sun, that clear blue sky, that cool green grass. But that warm day was long past. That warm day was before it all began . . . "