First Lines Fridays – 3rd June 2022

Hey everyone!

It is time for this week’s First Lines Fridays post!

First Lines Fridays is a weekly feature for book lovers. What if instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines?

Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page
Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first
Finally… reveal the book!

The first lines of today’s chosen book are:

Hanna sat alone on the back seat of the polished black car, her battered suitcase on her lap, the world outside only dimly seen through the misted windows. The engine, cooling, made an odd ticking sound, but otherwise there was a silence, until she heard crows calling.

And the book is…

The Silent Child by J.G. Kelly

GoodReads Synopsis:

SHE CAN’T HAVE A FUTURE UNTIL SHE HAS A PAST.

1944

LEO STERN arrives at the Nazi camp at Borek with his wife Irena and his two daughters. The Sterns are spared from the gas chamber when they witness a murder. But in a place that humanity has deserted, Leo is forced to make unimaginable choices to try to keep his family alive.

1961

For seventeen years, Hanna has been unable to remember her identity and how she was separated from her family at the end of the war, until the discovery of a letter among her late uncle’s possessions reveals her real name – HANNA STERN – and leads her to Berlin in search of her lost past.

Helped by former lover Peter, Hanna begins to piece together the shocking final days of Borek. But Hanna isn’t the only one with an interest in the camp, and lurking in the shadows is someone who would prefer Hanna’s history to remain silent.

Based on in-depth research and beautifully written, this a novel of memory and identity, and the long shadow of war.

Have you read this book?
If yes, what did you think of it?

Let me know in the comments!