Emmerspitz, 1938

MWSA Review

David Andrew Westwood has written another historical fiction about the impact of war on people in Emmersmitz, 1938.  It is the story of three adventurous young British girls who set out to have an adventure with old family friends in Austria. 

It is a revealing portrait of the changes on society caused by political ambition and war.  The girls find their old friends will not be friends in the future.  Along the way one young lady finds love, loses it, but saves a national Jewish treasure that she didn't even fully comprehend.

It is a good book and highly recommended to lovers of history, especially military history.

Reviewed by: Michael D. Mullins  (2015)

Author's Summary

Over the summer of 1938, three spoilt English girls take a trip to Austria to visit the sons of family friends. They hope to recreate the enjoyment of the boys’ visit to Britain two years earlier, but in the intervening two years things have changed, and for the worse. Austria has voted to become part of Germany, a Third Reich run by an ever-increasingly powerful Hitler.

Even the small Austrian town of Emmerspitz is affected by the spread of Nazism, and it seems that everyone there has their secrets. Without meaning to, the girls discover the darker side of their friends’ lives, and the mountain itself hides the largest secret of all.