Annelies
David R. Gillham’s new novel, Annelies, is a powerful and deeply humane new novel that asks the question: What if Anne Frank survived the Holocaust?
The year is 1945, and Anne Frank is sixteen years old. Having survived the concentration camps, but lost her mother and sister, she reunites with her father, Pim, in newly liberated Amsterdam.
But it’s not easy to fit the pieces of their life back together. Anne is adrift, haunted by the ghosts of the horrors they’ve experienced, while Pim is fixated on returning to normalcy. Her beloved diary has been lost, and her dreams of becoming a writer seem distant and pointless now.
As Anne struggles to overcome the brutality of memory and build a new life for herself, she grapples with heartbreak, grief, and ultimately the freedom of forgiveness. A story of trauma and redemption, Annelies not only honors Anne Frank’s legacy as a symbol of hope and perseverance, but also honors a complex young woman of great ambition and heart.
Anne Frank is a cultural icon whose diary painted a vivid picture of the Holocaust and made her an image of humanity in one of history’s darkest moments. But she was also a person—a precocious young girl with a rich inner life and tremendous skill as a writer. In this masterful new novel, David R. Gillham explores with breathtaking empathy the woman—and the writer—she might have become.
PRAISE for Annelies
“Not only a poignant reminder of all that was lost during the war, but a vivid, searching exploration of what it meant to exist in the aftermath.”
—Jessica Shattuck, New York Times bestselling author of The Women in the Castle
“In this haunting what-if, David Gillham asks us to reflect on the quandary of how one learns—in the unimaginable wake of the Holocaust—to live again, shedding a powerful, human light on the tragedy of lost potential.”
—Georgia Hunter, New York Times bestselling author of We Were the Lucky Ones
“In Annelies, David Gillham not only explores what might have happened if Anne Frank had survived, but also draws an intimate portrait of life as a Jewish survivor in post-war Amsterdam. By turns a coming-of-age novel and a story of survival, redemption, and family—Annelies is a meticulously researched, emotionally resonant what-if.”
—Jillian Cantor, author of Margot and The Lost Letter
“I had to slow down reading Annelies to better absorb the beauty and power of David Gillham’s words. His depth of understanding of human resilience and our capacity to survive and find the light after unimaginable darkness is a gift. A stunning evocation of the human spirit and its ability to inspire across borders, languages, and decades.”
—Kathleen Grissom, New York Times-bestselling author of The Kitchen House and Glory Over Everything