WEBVTT
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Hello fellow.
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I'm chair Historians.
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Welcome to the show.
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I'm Anne-Marie Cannon, your host, historical fiction author, and curious soul, always chasing the human side of history.
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Show notes include my website, links to content discussed in the episode, how to support the show, and a free short story download that introduces readers to bedlam from my soon to be released historical fiction series.
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On this podcast, my guests share the history they love most and we experience it through their eyes, what fascinates them, what they've uncovered, and why the story still matters.
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Let's get into it.
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Hello fellow armchair historians.
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I'm your host Anne-Marie Cannon, and today I'm joined by author Barbara Stark.
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Neiman Barbara's work spans centuries and borders from 20th century Germany shaped by war and displacement.
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To the perilous world of the Inquisition in Portugal, Spain, France, and Germany.
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Her newest novel Isabella's Way follows a 14-year-old girl navigating faith, identity, and survival through a clandestine network of safe houses.
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What Barbara describes as a 17th century version of the Underground Railroad.
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In this conversation we talk about history, learn through story, inherited memory, and what it means to search for emotional truth.
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Inside historical fact, we explore refugees and resistance, unexpected allies, and the powerful ways family histories echo forward into the present.
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So settle in because this episode reminds us that history is never just about the past.
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Barbara Stark, Neiman, thanks for joining us today.
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Welcome to Armchair Historians.
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Thank you, Annmarie.
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And as I said to you previously, I am so delighted to have found you and found armchair historians.
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I have been haunting listening and enjoying this podcast, so thanks for doing it.
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interview Barbar Stark-Nemon Tue 0857[00:00:00] Anne Marie: Barbara Stark, thanks for joining us today.
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Welcome to Armchair Historians.
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Barbara: Thank you, Annmarie.
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And as I said to you previously, I am so delighted to have found you and found armchair historians.
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~And~I have been haunting~and~listening and enjoying this podcast, so thanks for doing it.
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Thank you.
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Barbara: I appreciate that.
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And you know, we connected on a Facebook page for authors and I just, I knew right away, like I had two people reach out to me that are historical fiction writers.
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You were one of'em.
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And I was like, oh my God, this is a perfect match.
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I'm really excited to.
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Go on your journey with you about history~and, um, as I said earlier,~the first thing I ask is, what is your favorite history?
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Barbara:~And~as I responded to you,~um,~my favorite history is~actually~whatever I'm working on in my historical fiction journey.
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I love stories.
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[00:01:00] As a way to learn about particular areas of history.
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So I have done a deep dive into the experience of Germans in pre-World War I, into World War II and after World War II in Germany.
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Barbara: And I also now, my latest book takes place in 17th century,~which is~Inquisition era, Portugal, Spain, France, and Germany.
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So I've done deep dives into those periods, but pretty much I can engage with a story in any era and really love and learn more about it through those stories.
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~So~I have two questions, but I'll start with,~uh,~what.
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Anne Marie: Attracted you to the history of the book that you're working on right now, which maybe you could tell us the name of it.
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Is it out yet?
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When is it coming out?
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Tell us a little bit[about that history.
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~So~my current novel is called Isabella's Way,~a novel~it released on September 16th.
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~So it's new.
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~I'm,~as we speak~on book tour with it and it.
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Anne Marie: Is the story of a 14-year-old embroidery who must find her way out of Inquisition era Portugal~and find her way to,~through Spain and France~and~into,~um,~Germany in order to escape the inquisitors that are chasing her.
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~Uh,~she does not understand that her.
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Embroidery is being used by a clandestine network of safe houses, the 17th century version of an underground railroad,~in order~to signal safety or danger.
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Anne Marie: She also does not understand that she is not the good Catholic girl, that she was raised to believe that she was, that there's a.
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Different identity, a[Jewish identity, of her family, and~that~that's why she has to make this escape.
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~So~these things emerge over the course of the novel.
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Why this history?
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Anne Marie: So why this and why now?
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~This particular history.
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So,~Isabella came to me in 2011.
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I was on a kind of warrior woman bicycle trip from, Lisbon, Portugal to the Alhambra in Granada, Spain.
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We'd had some serious medical issues in our family.
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My husband was supposed to be with me.
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~Um,~he wasn't because he couldn't travel at that time.
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Anne Marie: My son was in Madrid.
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I wanted to visit him.
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we wanted to do this bike trip, so I did the bike trip There's a wonderful story, which I won't go into the whole thing about a Celtic standing stone circle and my writing down from this very challenging climb, and~this girl,~this 14-year-old[girl popped into my head.
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Anne Marie: I was in the middle of writing my first historical novel, even in darkness.
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I knew I had a second novel.
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In the pike.
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So I said, you need to wait because I can't do you now.
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And she did wait, through the writing and publication of two previous novels.
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~And~I served on the board of Jewish Family Services in my local community, which is the primary.
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Anne Marie: Agency that welcomes refugees into our county from all over the world,~and~I was very involved in~doing~strategic planning and in fundraising and so forth.
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My own two parents were refugees from Germany to the United States prior to World War II as teenagers.
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So the whole refugee concept.
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Is part of my DNA and part of my[choices, to use my skills~on behalf of, you know,~as a volunteer in agencies.
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Anne Marie: And then this girl popped into my head, and then to round it all off, I'm a fiber artist and so I was connected to all the embroidery that I saw, in that bike trip as we explored different.
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~Uh,~communities and the cultures surrounding them.
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So those things all conspired to make me do two more trips to the Iberian Peninsula, France, in Germany to actually trace the root of my characters as they made their way,~um, to,~to,~you know,~the end of the story.
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Anne Marie: Wow.
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I love that.
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That's how I connect to history as well.
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Travel and,~um,~family, you know, there's a family connection to pretty much everything that I do as far as writing and documentary,~uh,~filmmaking.
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Same, same.
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I know.
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That's why I was so[excited to see and read about all of the things that you're doing.
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Anne Marie:~So then I forgot the other question that came into my mind, but it'll pop back in~both of your novels weave together the personal and historical trauma with resilience and hope.
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How do you balance emotional truth with historical accuracy?
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Oh, I love that question.
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If I don't.
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Center myself around the emotional truth.
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I'm not writing the way I want to, so the emotional truth is at the center of my writing about these things.
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That said, I'm a bit of a stickler~and I, as I know many of your guests.
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Have declared this and I will declare it as well.
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~I love the research part of the books that I write, so I do the historical piece.
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Anne Marie: I very dedicated to doing[the research and I'm fortunate enough to be able to do the kind of traveling I've done.
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To get the sights and the sounds~and the~tastes and~the~colors, of the places~that~I visit.
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~But~I also do a lot of academic research, a lot of online research.
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Anne Marie:~And~it is a balancing act, but I'm never.
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Besieged by concerns about which thing has the priority.
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For me, the emotional truth takes precedence.
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~And~I've never been in a situation where I felt that there was a conflict between what I want to say and the historical truth, or what I want to say and the emotional truth.
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Anne Marie:~So~somehow I've managed to dodge that.
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Problem with balance, but I'm aware of it and~I'm, I'm~conscious of it.
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So~you this,~is this your third novel, the one that just came[out?
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~Yes.
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~Yes.
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So what were your other two and what was the history, those histories?
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~Excuse me.
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So~the first novel is based on a family story.
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Anne Marie: It's called Even in Darkness.
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It is based on the life of my great aunt who is the only member of~my grandfather's,~my maternal grandfather's family who did not escape Germany prior to the Holocaust.
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~And~she wouldn't leave the country because her.
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Mother wouldn't go, my great-grandmother.
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And because her husband had been mustard gassed in World War I and was ill,~and~if you were ill, you could not get an affidavit to come to this country.
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Anne Marie: And she wouldn't leave, her husband wouldn't leave her mother, so she stayed and she was a massage therapist.
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She ended up in a unusual relationship with a commandant at Ian spot, the concentration camp.
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She survived, kept everybody alive, her mother and her husband, and then lost everybody She fought to save, but went on to spend the rest of her life with a Catholic priest half her age in the most transcendent relationship~that~I've ever seen in Germany for all of her remaining~a hundred~years.
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Anne Marie: Wow.
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And I got to know and love this woman and the priest.
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And I thought, this is a very different Holocaust story.
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~This is not, and I, again,~going back to what you said before about resilience,~about~finding unexpected allies and being able to deal with unwelcome, unexpected events that happen to us, and then figuring out how to deal with it.
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Anne Marie:~And~she was the gold standard in my book.
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So I knew I had to write that story.
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And 85% of what happens in that book actually happened.
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My next novel is some people would say[very loosely based on my own life, but it's a what if book.
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What if things about my own life and my own family had turned out very differently?
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Anne Marie: What would that look like?
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~And~I.
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Love hard apple cider and had a dream of actually producing it.
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So I made my character do that.
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And so the book, it's called Hard Cider.
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It's a novel, it's contemporary.
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It takes place in North Port Michigan, which is where we have a lake home,~and it's kind of my heart center, so~it's not historical, but heavily researched in the apple and hard cider production.
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Anne Marie:~And it's, it's,~it's a set piece for Northern Michigan Beauty and Lake Country~and so forth.
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And so~that book had to come out and then I went back to historical fiction with Isabella's Way.
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~So, you know,~they tell you you're~really~supposed to create a brand and stick to it.
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Not so much in my writing life.
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Anne Marie: Yeah.
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~No, I love that you're taking us on this journey and what an incredible first novel~that is an amazing story.
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~Like so many things about it are contrary and~you know,~it reminds me of my mother.
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~So~when she was a child,~what happened is, um.
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Her family, part of~her family was executed in World War I, as the Germans, moved through Belgium during the rape of Belgium.
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Anne Marie: I don't know if you've ever heard of that, but~Yes.
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~Some people said it wasn't.
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I know it was because of what happened in my family.
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~Uh,~her family was hiding under a,~um,~aqueduct in Neff Belgium and the Ger Well, one of the things with the Germans is that they were.
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On~an~amphetamines,~that's what kept that engine going for so long.~ Anne Marie: And the further they moved through Belgium, the more paranoid~they became~and~the more~violent they became.
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~And so,~there was a crossing~there where.
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~Right in front of~my grandmother's house,~my great-grandmother's house.
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~And my mom's great aunt lived on the other side of the road anyway, so they were executed basically.~ Anne Marie: Some of them survived, some~of them~didn't.
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The mother of,~uh,~the five children was actually at my mother's wedding in France,~but, um.
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So I'm making this a really long story about myself.
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I'm sorry, I just, I've gotten away with it, but what you're pointing out is that~these elemental family stories,~you know,~we can talk about generational[trauma, I believe in that.
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Anne Marie: Yeah.
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But I also prefer to think of it that these are~marker~ways in which we form our own sense of who we are and where we came from,~and.
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~What we need to move forward.
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~And,~and it feeds our sense~of,~of our own identity in ways that I find~very,~very powerful.
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So I think,~you know,~what you've just described~is,~is a perfect example of that.
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Anne Marie:~And~knowing those stories and transmitting those stories to me is extremely important.
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~So yeah, no, I think,~I think,~you know, you are~illustrating~what pro what not~prompted me,~but I is the story of my heart, even in darkness.
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~Mm-hmm.
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~Because it informed who I've become as a person.
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Anne Marie: So this great aunt's brother, my grandfather.
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Was one of the most important people in my life, and he was so close to her even though they were separated by continents and years~and so forth.
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And the, and~just observing that connection between the two of them~and, uh,~and his stories[about her trained me to think about people in really important ways.
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Anne Marie:~Um.
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Yeah, no, I think what you're saying is really relevant, so~yeah, that's interesting.
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~And I think that, we both know we're both connected to history in that way.
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Everything you just said is, something that I've come to believe and think about as well.
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Anne Marie: I think~that,~you can call it~the~trauma, like you said,~it is trauma.
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~Mm-hmm.
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always think about.
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With genealogy~is~all the near misses that had to happen for us to be here.
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~Yes.
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And~I think~that with, experience~that~happened in my mother's family 25 years before World War ii, so then 25 years later we have World War ii.
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Anne Marie: Where is my mother?
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~Uh,~gone to live with her great-grandmother right in front of the monument~that is there~to the people that perished in that, execution.
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~Wow.
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And so~she's seven years old and she knows the story and oh my God, the Germans are coming again.
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~And~her grandmother wouldn't leave, therefore her mother wouldn't leave Belgium.
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Anne Marie: Finally in, the[legend in the family is they got on the last train leaving Belgium, they end up in a place called Laro.
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France~and~only to be occupied by the German military, shortly thereafter.
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So she's living in this town at the age of eight,~and there's a story, and I am going back to what we first started talking about Anne Marie:~Kind of the nuance of these situations.
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But~my mom tells a story.
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She's eight years old, her brother is five.
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They don't have money, but they do love pastries.
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~And~so~they would go and basically their form of entertainment go, was to~go to the patisserie~and~look in the window and dream about eating the pastries~in there.~ Anne Marie:~And so.
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~This,~uh,~German soldier, and she always said there was a difference between the SS and,~uh, the plain German military, but there was a young German soldier, looked at them, walked into the, pastry shop, and when he came out, he gave~them both.
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Pastry you had bought~them both a pastry~and it's just~it shoots everything we believe about right and wrong, good and bad.
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Anne Marie:~Like~that story always sticks with me and I'm always interested in that nuance,~like,~the gray areas of situations like this.
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And that's why I love that.
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~Isn't that, go ahead.
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Sorry.
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I'm sorry.
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~It's~to me, I mean, I'm, I'm jumping in because this is~so[00:15:00] important to me.
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In my great aunt's story in Isabella's Ways.
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Anne Marie: In that story, I focus on unexpected allies.
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~Like~we have these narratives that~have developed around, our concept that,~if you're Jewish, all Germans were bad,~mm-hmm.
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~Because of what happened during the Holocaust, but that's not true.
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There were countless stories In my own family.
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Anne Marie:~You're talking about this story in your family.
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~You never know where you find notion to identify where you can recruit allies when you're in trouble.
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If you let go of these preconceived notions and consider people for whom they really are and recognize.
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That, and there are countless stories about that.
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Anne Marie:~It's just it, to me it's,~it's a really important notion, especially where we are in our culture and~in our~politics today,~is~to~really~resist being in a silo[because nothing's black and white.
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And~so~that's a really good example of that That's an unexpected ally.
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Anne Marie: Yeah.
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That's how this started is you use that term.
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I like that unexpected ally.
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Yeah.
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And I have thought a lot about my,~uh,~family and.
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~The resistors, the resistance,~the underground resistance.
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There were several of those in my family during World War ii, and I have been thinking a lot about them since things have changed and the political landscape~and I do, I~draw on their experiences and think about, well, what was that like for them?
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Anne Marie: And try to think bigger than.
00:20:51.339 --> 00:20:57.339
The narrow-mindedness that~really~I'm kind of drawn to is,~you know,~black and white.
00:20:57.339 --> 00:20:57.740
~Exactly.
00:20:57.740 --> 00:21:03.339
Let me look at my list here.~ Anne Marie:~Okay, here's a good one.
00:21:03.339 --> 00:21:10.140
~What connections do you see between the stories you tell and the world we live in today?
00:21:10.140 --> 00:21:11.339
Oh my goodness.
00:21:11.339 --> 00:21:12.940
Like I said before.
00:21:12.940 --> 00:21:23.740
[I worked for 15 years on the board of a refugee welcoming, very fraught situation because Jewish Family Services started bringing Russian refugees into the United States.
00:21:23.740 --> 00:21:30.539
And then when that~sort of~era ended,~and then~they were bringing Afghani and African and.
00:21:30.539 --> 00:21:35.740
Syrian refugees who were escaping persecution~that they were experiencing~in those countries.
00:21:35.740 --> 00:21:44.940
And~that, you know,~that was a little bit fraught for a Jewish community agency, but the agency had no problem with it.
00:21:44.940 --> 00:21:52.140
Some of the other people~did, but they~did it because~it,~it's the right thing to do.
00:21:52.140 --> 00:21:54.940
~You know,~these people needed help~and.
00:21:54.940 --> 00:21:56.140
~We don't discriminate.
00:21:56.140 --> 00:22:01.740
~So~my own parents were both refugees, so I was very involved in that.
00:22:01.740 --> 00:22:12.539
~And then~I started writing about this[story of Isabella, and I had no idea when I started writing that book, the fraught situation~that~I would.
00:22:12.539 --> 00:22:18.140
Recognize in our country for immigrants and refugees and the incredible politics around that.
00:22:18.140 --> 00:22:24.539
~So~the reasons I started writing this story were meaning this girl jumped into my head.
00:22:24.539 --> 00:22:30.539
I knew that~my own,~my maternal grandmother's family~I knew~in the 17th century.
00:22:30.539 --> 00:22:37.740
Or actually into the 16th century had left Portugal because of the Inquisition and went to Hamburg, Germany.
00:22:37.740 --> 00:22:39.339
Anne Marie:~Oh, wow.
00:22:39.339 --> 00:22:40.940
That's all I knew.
00:22:40.940 --> 00:22:41.339
Wow.
00:22:41.339 --> 00:22:41.740
Okay.
00:22:41.740 --> 00:22:43.339
~I didn't realize that.
00:22:43.339 --> 00:22:44.539
That is fascinating.
00:22:44.539 --> 00:22:53.740
So during COVID, I did your basic deep dive into ancestry.com and actually found my ancestor who was born in~a brunch,~Portugal.
00:22:53.740 --> 00:22:57.740
In 1586 and died in Hamburg, Germany in[1640~something.
00:22:57.740 --> 00:22:58.140
Wow.
00:22:58.140 --> 00:23:03.740
And I, had already known my great-grandfather on that side was an armchair genealogist.
00:23:03.740 --> 00:23:11.740
Anne Marie:~And~I had this beautiful scroll in his~gorgeous~handwriting of~my, of great-grandmother's family,~going way back.
00:23:11.740 --> 00:23:14.140
And so I knew that this.
00:23:14.140 --> 00:23:17.740
You know,~there was a~very~famous Portuguese name.
00:23:17.740 --> 00:23:19.740
~That was my grandmother's name.
00:23:19.740 --> 00:23:22.539
So I knew I had that background.
00:23:22.539 --> 00:23:40.539
~But you know, I did this bike ride, I wasn't thinking about that other than loosely~Oh yeah, I was somewhere there.~ Anne Marie: But by the end of that bike ride, I had seen so many places and had learned so much about that.
00:23:40.539 --> 00:23:53.339
Diaspora~that you know,~of the expulsion from Spain and Portugal over a couple of centuries that I realized,~huh, you know,~this actually applies to me,~you know,~and my family.
00:23:53.339 --> 00:23:57.339
So isn't that something how we're drawn to that history?
00:23:57.339 --> 00:23:59.740
Anne Marie:~It is,~it is.
00:23:59.740 --> 00:24:06.140
And I keep thinking,~you know, is this just sort of, you a selfish kind of.
00:24:06.140 --> 00:24:08.140
Personal journey~that I'm on.
00:24:08.140 --> 00:24:11.339
~But then I realize, no,[this is iconic.
00:24:11.339 --> 00:24:15.740
This is the story of immigrants in so many different versions.
00:24:15.740 --> 00:24:24.140
It's the story of repression~and~in so many different versions~it,~and~you know,~this is just one of'em.
00:24:24.140 --> 00:24:25.339
Anne Marie:~Mm-hmm.
00:24:25.339 --> 00:24:28.539
~So I felt like,~okay,~this story~has.
00:24:28.539 --> 00:24:30.539
It~has some importance globally.
00:24:30.539 --> 00:24:42.539
~And so, but~the reason I started writing this story is very different over the five or six years between when I started writing it and when I've published it.
00:24:42.539 --> 00:24:55.339
The world in the United States of America has changed so much regarding~this particular topic Anne Marie:~Of~refugees and immigrants that the reason I started writing it and the circumstances.
00:24:55.339 --> 00:25:08.940
In which I'm bringing this book out this year,~this time as~a book about refugees, a book with Jewish content, it's very different than what I thought I was writing about~or~initially.
00:25:08.940 --> 00:25:09.339
~Mm-hmm.
00:25:09.339 --> 00:25:15.339
And I,~I'm very[aware of that shift and~it's,~it's been kind of interesting.
00:25:15.339 --> 00:25:17.740
Anne Marie: Yeah, it is interesting.
00:25:17.740 --> 00:25:22.140
I'm just relating on so many different levels as you talk.
00:25:22.140 --> 00:25:29.740
~I, and I'm interested, I, read a book by Felipa Gregory called The Queen's Fool,~and it's about, yes.
00:25:29.740 --> 00:25:31.740
~Did you read that one?
00:25:31.740 --> 00:25:33.339
I love Felipe Gregory.
00:25:33.339 --> 00:25:34.940
Oh, so do I.
00:25:34.940 --> 00:25:43.740
~But~that book got me really interested in the,~you know,~Spanish Inquisition and,~yes.~ happened to the Jewish people from Spain.
00:25:43.740 --> 00:25:48.140
~And then~I have a friend~actually~who is,~um,~Mexican.
00:25:48.140 --> 00:25:50.539
~We did,~she did her DNA.
00:25:50.539 --> 00:25:56.140
~And so I love digging into that, people's DNA and ancestry and all that.
00:25:56.140 --> 00:26:03.740
And came out~in her family, she had no idea~that one of her ancestors was Jewish from Spain.
00:26:03.740 --> 00:26:05.339
Anne Marie: Oh yeah.
00:26:05.339 --> 00:26:10.140
And so that has always made me curious what was that about?
00:26:10.140 --> 00:26:12.940
~And it was deep in their past.
00:26:12.940 --> 00:26:19.339
And so this kind of,~you know,~speaks to that, this history that you're talking about.
00:26:19.339 --> 00:26:28.140
And then of course we come full circle and the whole,~um,~refugee, immigration, issue in our country really around the world.
00:26:28.140 --> 00:26:33.339
Anne Marie:~It just, it it can help but~[00:22:00] come full circle.
00:26:33.339 --> 00:26:44.539
And I think that's what makes the work relevant~is, you know, you,~you talked earlier about the emotional truth, and I always start from that place too.
00:26:44.539 --> 00:26:48.940
What is,~you know,~the emotional truth as I perceive it.
00:26:48.940 --> 00:26:54.140
But also that is the thing that~I think makes the story relevant.
00:26:54.140 --> 00:26:57.740
Anne Marie: Along with if, the reader, the listener.
00:26:57.740 --> 00:27:02.539
~Whoever it is, if they~can connect the dots back to today.
00:27:02.539 --> 00:27:05.339
I mean,~that,~that's everything right there.
00:27:05.339 --> 00:27:17.740
~And~you definitely cover it all with,~the book,~the new book, and~also~everything you've said about it and how you've related it to, today, and I think that's important.
00:27:17.740 --> 00:27:18.940
Anne Marie: Yeah.
00:27:18.940 --> 00:27:29.740
~You know,~one of the things I realized is that I'm very interested in strong women characters, so all three of my books have strong women characters.
00:27:29.740 --> 00:27:40.140
~I'm very interested that,~like I said before, life presents us with unpleasant, unexpected issues, and[I'm very interested in how~do~we deal with that.
00:27:40.140 --> 00:27:43.339
Anne Marie: And how do we recruit allies?
00:27:43.339 --> 00:27:45.740
How do we recognize unexpected allies?
00:27:45.740 --> 00:27:48.940
And then where do we go with that?
00:27:48.940 --> 00:28:00.140
And so that's kind of a overarching theme in all my books and,~you know,~Isabella's specifically about the~whole~refugee and escape~and that kind of thing.
00:28:00.140 --> 00:28:04.940
And I just,~I'm always interested, how do we deal with that?
00:28:04.940 --> 00:28:11.339
Anne Marie: How do we move forward, in a way that is more positive than negative?
00:28:11.339 --> 00:28:16.940
~You know, like~how do we remain undefeated by those~kinds of, of~situations?
00:28:16.940 --> 00:28:17.740
~I, yeah.
00:28:17.740 --> 00:28:24.539
And~as a reflection point,~I think that~we both have family who have persevered through~Yep.
00:28:24.539 --> 00:28:24.940
Just.
00:28:24.940 --> 00:28:25.740
~Unconscionable situations.
00:28:25.740 --> 00:28:32.140
~And~that~in and of itself~tells me I can persevere through this because they did.
00:28:32.140 --> 00:28:40.140
Anne Marie: And yes, what I'm going through is nothing like they did and I have their DNA in me.
00:28:40.140 --> 00:28:43.740
~Boy, we've gotten deep on this, haven't we, Barbara?
00:28:43.740 --> 00:28:48.940
Well, speaking of DNA,~one of the things[that just blew me away.
00:28:48.940 --> 00:28:50.940
Is,~uh,~some ridiculously high.
00:28:50.940 --> 00:29:05.339
And~I,~I don't wanna say it out loud because I'm not sure the number is 78%, but please don't hold me to that of Portuguese people have some Jewish DNA~in their,~in their profile.
00:29:05.339 --> 00:29:07.339
Anne Marie:~And it's because.
00:29:07.339 --> 00:29:24.539
~In 1492, the expulsion from Spain of Jews and Muslims, many, many, many just crossed the border over into Portugal because they had not imposed~all of~the strictures of the Inquisition~at the the same way that the people in Spain did.
00:29:24.539 --> 00:29:29.339
and those people were converso, they were people who converted to Catholicism.
00:29:29.339 --> 00:29:31.339
Anne Marie: Some did it.
00:29:31.339 --> 00:29:32.940
Truly and became Catholic.
00:29:32.940 --> 00:29:40.140
Some did it okay, I'm gonna pretend I'm Catholic, but really I'm gonna hold onto my Jewish heritage.
00:29:40.140 --> 00:29:48.940
But there was a tremendous[assimilation of Jewish people into the Portuguese population,~and~when I heard that statistic, I went, wow.
00:29:48.940 --> 00:29:57.339
~And then, you were talking about the,~I think it was your~Mexican person,~so~Mary Morris, who's a wonderful author.
00:29:57.339 --> 00:30:17.339
Anne Marie: Who wrote a wonderful blurb for, Isabella's Way, wrote a book called Gateway to the Moon that talks about that recognition and discovery that so many people in the diaspora from Spain and Portugal came to the New world, Mexico, New Mexico, into the United States, had this.
00:30:17.339 --> 00:30:20.539
Sephardic Jewish background that no one knew about.
00:30:20.539 --> 00:30:34.539
Anne Marie: These were all devout Catholics, but they discovered it and their mothers would be lighting candles in the basement on Friday night, and nobody knew why that happened, but they just did it.
00:30:34.539 --> 00:30:38.140
It was part of their family tradition,~you know?
00:30:38.140 --> 00:30:45.740
~So there were these[Jewish elements of their lives that they didn't understand were Jewish until we got DNA.
00:30:45.740 --> 00:30:46.940
Anne Marie:~Fascinating.
00:30:46.940 --> 00:30:47.339
Fascinating.
00:30:47.339 --> 00:30:55.339
we did my mom's DNA, she wanted to have it done and~she was,~didn't have long for this world.
00:30:55.339 --> 00:31:01.740
So we did her DNA and interestingly enough,~there,~there is, some markers for Eskenazi Jew.
00:31:01.740 --> 00:31:02.140
~Yep.
00:31:02.140 --> 00:31:06.140
Anyways, but you know, they,~she grew up Catholic and.
00:31:06.140 --> 00:31:14.940
~You know,~their story isn't the Jewish story, but it is peripherally the Jewish story,~so, well, it's,~it's the persecution story.
00:31:14.940 --> 00:31:16.140
Anne Marie:~Yeah.
00:31:16.140 --> 00:31:17.339
Yeah, for sure.
00:31:17.339 --> 00:31:23.339
~What else do you want us to know about this history that I haven't~asked?
00:31:23.339 --> 00:31:24.539
You know, it's.
00:31:24.539 --> 00:31:41.339
W~as I've been on book tour~now,~it's fascinating to me how little most people know about the Inquisition, which started,~I think~in the 12th century and wasn't really put to sleep until 1830 something, I think 36 or 37.
00:31:41.339 --> 00:31:48.539
Anne Marie: And it was such an[important, issue throughout all of Europe and into the new world.
00:31:48.539 --> 00:31:56.140
~And~I knew about it, but not as much as I learned about it when I researched Isabella's way.
00:31:56.140 --> 00:32:02.539
~But~it's so interesting to me that that's an era of history that is less known.
00:32:02.539 --> 00:32:04.940
~And~that was surprising to me.
00:32:04.940 --> 00:32:06.140
Anne Marie:~So.
00:32:06.140 --> 00:32:12.940
~Perhaps it would be surprising to your listeners, how can we find more out about this history?
00:32:12.940 --> 00:32:16.539
I cover a lot of it in Isabel's Way.
00:32:16.539 --> 00:32:17.740
~Read the book.
00:32:17.740 --> 00:32:18.940
Read the book.
00:32:18.940 --> 00:32:20.140
Read the book.
00:32:20.140 --> 00:32:34.539
And you know,~I, I, I an author's note that sort of describes it,~but~read Mary Morris's Gateway to the Moon, which you know, follows, over centuries of, you know, family that discovers their heritage.
00:32:34.539 --> 00:32:43.339
Anne Marie: And there's an amazing book, by Ruth Behar called,~uh~oh, I'm gonna forget the name, across so many Cs.
00:32:43.339 --> 00:32:45.339
It's about four[12-year-old girls.
00:32:45.339 --> 00:32:52.140
Over the course of four different centuries, starting in the Iberian Peninsula and ending up in Miami.
00:32:52.140 --> 00:32:57.339
~And~each of them experiences life as a refugee into the next era.
00:32:57.339 --> 00:33:04.940
Anne Marie:~You know,~going from the Iberian Peninsula,~I think~into Turkey,~and~then Cuba and then Miami.
00:33:04.940 --> 00:33:13.740
~And so~there are a lot of stories about it, but I'm sure there are also a lot of histories about it.
00:33:13.740 --> 00:33:18.940
Anne Marie:~Well, and~I'm curious about the pivot to writing for you.
00:33:18.940 --> 00:33:23.740
You said that~you, let me see, I have it here somewhere.
00:33:23.740 --> 00:33:24.140
Yeah.
00:33:24.140 --> 00:33:30.140
So,~the storytelling began because I had a grandfather who was an attorney in Berlin.
00:33:30.140 --> 00:33:46.940
~I mean,~he was born in 1892 and he escaped Germany in 1938 and ended up working for a paper box factory in[Detroit, and then he got readmitted to the bar in Germany to do restitution work for people who'd lost.
00:33:46.940 --> 00:33:50.539
Their businesses, their property, their education, and their health.
00:33:50.539 --> 00:33:52.940
~And~the German government gave restitution.
00:33:52.940 --> 00:33:59.740
~So~he got readmitted to the bar and four times a year traveled from Detroit to Germany.
00:33:59.740 --> 00:34:01.339
He was an orator.
00:34:01.339 --> 00:34:02.940
~He was~a storyteller.
00:34:02.940 --> 00:34:06.940
~He was a,~an amazing, model for telling stories~and.
00:34:06.940 --> 00:34:12.539
~As grandchildren, we got a better dessert if we told him a good story.
00:34:12.539 --> 00:34:15.739
Anne Marie:~And that was where it began.
00:34:15.739 --> 00:34:20.539
~As a child, I was also a very avid reader early on.
00:34:20.539 --> 00:34:25.739
And then I became a English teacher and a speech and language therapist.
00:34:25.739 --> 00:34:29.739
So I was teaching kids how to read and write.
00:34:29.739 --> 00:34:32.940
I was working with children who had challenges.
00:34:32.940 --> 00:34:41.739
Telling their stories, and I had to figure out what do they need in order to be able to communicate more effectively.
00:34:41.739 --> 00:34:48.539
Anne Marie:~So there's this through line, but~my bucket list[item was to write a novel.
00:34:48.539 --> 00:34:56.139
~So~I retired and started writing after a 30 year career in education and working in hospitals with kids.
00:34:56.139 --> 00:34:59.340
I retired in order to start writing books.
00:34:59.340 --> 00:35:01.340
So that's kind of It.
00:35:01.340 --> 00:35:03.739
I call it my encore career.
00:35:03.739 --> 00:35:05.739
And that's what it was.
00:35:05.739 --> 00:35:06.940
Your encore career.
00:35:06.940 --> 00:35:09.340
Anne Marie: I loved my career.
00:35:09.340 --> 00:35:09.739
~Yeah.
00:35:09.739 --> 00:35:12.139
~I was pretty good at it.
00:35:12.139 --> 00:35:20.139
I never dreamed~that~I could have another career~that would be~as satisfying and successful as that first one.
00:35:20.139 --> 00:35:22.940
~So here's my gratitude expression right now.
00:35:22.940 --> 00:35:24.940
~I'm a very lucky person.
00:35:24.940 --> 00:35:26.940
So are you traditionally published?
00:35:26.940 --> 00:35:36.539
I am published by She Writes, press, all three of my books have been published by She Writes Press, which is a hybrid publisher.
00:35:36.539 --> 00:35:37.739
Anne Marie: Mm-hmm.
00:35:37.739 --> 00:35:43.739
And that is kind of halfway, it's like a interim between self-publishing and traditional[publishing.
00:35:43.739 --> 00:35:47.739
So I invest upfront~for,~in my publication process,~it's.
00:35:47.739 --> 00:35:51.340
S~manuscripts are vetted and not everybody can publish.
00:35:51.340 --> 00:36:02.539
There's a requirement~to,~to achieve a certain level of, editing before~you know~your manuscript is accepted for publication, I get gorgeous cover design, internal book design.
00:36:02.539 --> 00:36:04.940
Anne Marie: Most importantly, professional distribution.
00:36:04.940 --> 00:36:08.539
Like we're distributed right now through Simon and Schuster.
00:36:08.539 --> 00:36:19.739
~Um, so~we get good book distribution~and we get~a beautiful book, and then we get a much greater percentage of royalties than people who publish traditionally.
00:36:19.739 --> 00:36:25.739
~Um,~but we do our own publicity and~our own~marketing, or we hire people.
00:36:25.739 --> 00:36:28.539
Anne Marie:~To help us with that.
00:36:28.539 --> 00:36:30.940
So it's kind of an interim.
00:36:30.940 --> 00:36:47.340
~When I first decided~to~that I was gonna do more than print 50 copies of even in darkness and give it to my family and friends~when~I[00:32:00] realized I had something~better and~more globally relevant~than that.
00:36:47.340 --> 00:36:52.940
found Brooke Warner,~who is~my publisher of She Writes Press, and I said.
00:36:52.940 --> 00:36:57.739
I wanna work with that person~and, um,~the rest is history.
00:36:57.739 --> 00:36:58.139
~Interesting.
00:36:58.139 --> 00:36:58.940
That's interesting.
00:36:58.940 --> 00:37:12.139
I'm,~I'm really interested in the publishing and~the~writing part because I'm just starting that journey and~I will, check it out or, you know, like~we can talk more about that.
00:37:12.139 --> 00:37:12.539
~Okay.
00:37:12.539 --> 00:37:19.340
Yeah, I have an imprint, Belgian Rabbit Publishing and,~you know,~I'm gonna move forward with that.
00:37:19.340 --> 00:37:26.539
Anne Marie: I do need~an~an editor~though~to do~like~a final run of the book.
00:37:26.539 --> 00:37:28.139
So that's~so~important.
00:37:28.139 --> 00:37:28.539
~Yeah.
00:37:28.539 --> 00:37:38.139
~Finding an editor that you work well with~and~that you feel comfortable with, that gets you and gets the book that's so important.
00:37:38.139 --> 00:37:40.539
Yeah, where can we find you?
00:37:40.539 --> 00:37:44.539
I am on Facebook, Barbara Stark, Neiman my author page.
00:37:44.539 --> 00:37:51.340
Anne Marie: And I have a pretty[elaborate website@barbarastarkneman.com, and the Neiman part is spelled N-E-M-O-N, because.
00:37:51.340 --> 00:37:53.739
That's a weird spelling of Neiman.
00:37:53.739 --> 00:38:03.340
And I'm on Instagram, I'm on threads, and~that's pretty much, I am~dipping my toe into TikTok,~but I'm really not there yet.
00:38:03.340 --> 00:38:04.139
You're brave.
00:38:04.139 --> 00:38:09.739
will link out to your website and all those places in the show notes.
00:38:09.739 --> 00:38:10.940
Anne Marie:~Um.
00:38:10.940 --> 00:38:18.539
Just, you know, one more time,~is there anything that I didn't ask you that you wanted to say?
00:38:18.539 --> 00:38:18.940
No.
00:38:18.940 --> 00:38:24.139
You've asked me all the important questions and thank you for doing that.
00:38:24.139 --> 00:38:30.139
Well, thank you for being here and sharing this important history and your process~and.
00:38:30.139 --> 00:38:32.940
You know, I can't say it enough.
00:38:32.940 --> 00:38:43.739
~I connect to pretty much everything you talked about, about your craft and how you link into it through history, through~uh,~this idea of emotional truth.
00:38:43.739 --> 00:38:53.739
Anne Marie: And you know, I~just~really connect with that and I so appreciate you and what you're doing and how you're doing it.
00:38:53.739 --> 00:38:55.739
[Thank you so much Anne-Marie.
00:38:55.739 --> 00:39:00.539
There is one more thing, which is I love doing book clubs.
00:39:00.539 --> 00:39:09.739
So if any of your listeners have book clubs that they'd be interested in,~um,~having,~you know,~any one of my books.
00:39:09.739 --> 00:39:16.940
Anne Marie:~But~I do zoom into book clubs and if I'm local, I come to book clubs.
00:39:16.940 --> 00:39:33.739
~So that, that was the one more thing I know I~just~immediately thought of my, partner's stepmother who I just visited for her 80th birthday and,~um, her, some of~her book club buddies were there~and they were, about books.
00:39:33.739 --> 00:39:36.940
This would be a good book for them.
00:39:36.940 --> 00:39:39.340
~I think they'd really appreciate it.
00:39:39.340 --> 00:39:44.539
~They love to read books about,~uh,~women and strong women in particular.
00:39:44.539 --> 00:39:44.940
~Yep.
00:39:44.940 --> 00:39:47.739
So~I'll let her know about it.
00:39:47.739 --> 00:39:48.139
Great.
00:39:48.139 --> 00:39:50.139
Thank you Anne Marie:~okay.
00:39:50.139 --> 00:39:52.539
And~thank you so much, Anne-Marie.
00:39:52.539 --> 00:39:54.139
This was really delightful.
00:39:54.139 --> 00:39:54.539
~Okay.
00:39:54.539 --> 00:39:56.940
~Thank you for being here, Barbara.
00:39:56.940 --> 00:39:58.940
I really enjoyed our conversation.
00:39:58.940 --> 00:39:59.570
Thank you.
00:39:59.570 --> 00:40:01.159
I appreciate that.
00:40:01.159 --> 00:40:10.300
And you know, we connected on a Facebook page for authors and I knew right away, like I had two people reach out to me that are historical fiction writers.
00:40:10.300 --> 00:40:11.230
You were one of'em.
00:40:11.559 --> 00:40:14.050
And I was like, oh my God, this is a perfect match.
00:40:14.300 --> 00:40:15.710
I'm really excited to.
00:40:16.260 --> 00:40:22.489
Go on your journey with you about history the first thing I ask is, what is your favorite history?
00:40:24.090 --> 00:40:32.750
as I responded to you, my favorite history is whatever I'm working on in my historical fiction journey.
00:40:33.409 --> 00:40:36.170
I love stories.
00:40:36.965 --> 00:40:40.324
As a way to learn about particular areas of history.
00:40:40.324 --> 00:40:52.594
So I have done a deep dive into the experience of Germans in pre-World War I, into World War II and after World War II in Germany.
00:40:53.045 --> 00:41:02.809
And my latest book takes place in 17th century, Inquisition era, Portugal, Spain, France, and Germany.
00:41:03.650 --> 00:41:19.550
So I've done deep dives into those periods, but pretty much I can engage with a story in any era and really love and learn more about it through those stories.
00:41:20.329 --> 00:41:23.219
I have two questions, but I'll start with, what.
00:41:23.684 --> 00:41:31.364
Attracted you to the history of the book that you're working on right now, which maybe you could tell us the name of it.
00:41:31.364 --> 00:41:32.385
Is it out yet?
00:41:32.445 --> 00:41:33.644
When is it coming out?
00:41:34.105 --> 00:41:36.054
Tell us a little bit about that history.
00:41:36.965 --> 00:41:43.344
my current novel is called Isabella's Way, it released on September 16th.
00:41:43.394 --> 00:41:46.054
I'm, on book tour with it it.
00:41:46.715 --> 00:42:05.179
Is the story of a 14-year-old embroidery who must find her way out of Inquisition era Portugal through Spain and France into, Germany in order to escape the inquisitors that are chasing her.
00:42:05.579 --> 00:42:09.929
she does not understand that her.
00:42:10.514 --> 00:42:22.284
Embroidery is being used by a clandestine network of safe houses, the 17th century version of an underground railroad, to signal safety or danger.
00:42:22.614 --> 00:42:31.025
She also does not understand that she is not the good Catholic girl, that she was raised to believe that she was, that there's a.
00:42:31.644 --> 00:42:38.744
Different identity, a Jewish identity, of her family, and that's why she has to make this escape.
00:42:38.875 --> 00:42:42.114
these things emerge over the course of the novel.
00:42:43.885 --> 00:42:45.264
Why this history?
00:42:46.675 --> 00:42:48.655
So why this and why now?
00:42:49.025 --> 00:42:52.054
Isabella came to me in 2011.
00:42:52.400 --> 00:43:02.340
I was on a kind of warrior woman bicycle trip from, Lisbon, Portugal to the Alhambra in Granada, Spain.
00:43:02.869 --> 00:43:06.739
We'd had some serious medical issues in our family.
00:43:06.739 --> 00:43:08.510
My husband was supposed to be with me.
00:43:08.940 --> 00:43:11.849
he wasn't because he couldn't travel at that time.
00:43:12.135 --> 00:43:13.619
My son was in Madrid.
00:43:14.019 --> 00:43:15.400
I wanted to visit him.
00:43:15.409 --> 00:43:32.480
we wanted to do this bike trip, so I did the bike trip There's a wonderful story, which I won't go into the whole thing about a Celtic standing stone circle and my writing down from this very challenging climb, and this 14-year-old girl popped into my head.
00:43:32.880 --> 00:43:37.320
I was in the middle of writing my first historical novel, even in darkness.
00:43:37.710 --> 00:43:39.690
I knew I had a second novel.
00:43:40.454 --> 00:43:44.565
So I said, you need to wait because I can't do you now.
00:43:45.074 --> 00:43:51.125
And she did wait, through the writing and publication of two previous novels.
00:43:51.635 --> 00:44:01.385
I served on the board of Jewish Family Services in my local community, which is the primary.
00:44:02.300 --> 00:44:13.820
Agency that welcomes refugees into our county from all over the world, I was very involved in strategic planning and in fundraising and so forth.
00:44:14.090 --> 00:44:23.269
My own two parents were refugees from Germany to the United States prior to World War II as teenagers.
00:44:23.300 --> 00:44:25.635
So the whole refugee concept.
00:44:26.449 --> 00:44:34.019
Is part of my DNA and part of my choices, to use my skills as a volunteer in agencies.
00:44:34.659 --> 00:44:47.375
and then to round it all off, I'm a fiber artist and so I was connected to all the embroidery that I saw, in that bike trip as we explored different.
00:44:47.724 --> 00:44:50.875
communities and the cultures surrounding them.
00:44:51.235 --> 00:45:08.264
So those things all conspired to make me do two more trips to the Iberian Peninsula, France, in Germany to actually trace the root of my characters as they made their way, to, the end of the story.
00:45:09.675 --> 00:45:10.065
Wow.
00:45:10.065 --> 00:45:10.755
I love that.
00:45:10.855 --> 00:45:12.925
That's how I connect to history as well.
00:45:12.925 --> 00:45:22.925
Travel and, family, you know, there's a family connection to pretty much everything that I do as far as writing and documentary, filmmaking.
00:45:22.925 --> 00:45:23.284
I know.
00:45:23.284 --> 00:45:28.264
That's why I was so excited to see and read about all of the things that you're doing.
00:45:30.824 --> 00:45:36.824
both of your novels weave together the personal and historical trauma with resilience and hope.
00:45:37.304 --> 00:45:41.864
How do you balance emotional truth with historical accuracy?
00:45:44.039 --> 00:45:45.525
Oh, I love that question.
00:45:46.844 --> 00:45:48.105
If I don't.
00:45:49.394 --> 00:45:53.025
Center myself around the emotional truth.
00:45:54.614 --> 00:46:06.614
I'm not writing the way I want to, so the emotional truth is at the center of my writing about these things.
00:46:07.244 --> 00:46:19.094
That said, I'm a bit of a stickler I love the research part of the books that I write, so I do the historical piece.
00:46:19.125 --> 00:46:34.155
I very dedicated to doing the research and for me, the research, as you suggested, does involve, and I'm fortunate enough to be able to do the kind of traveling I've done.
00:46:34.585 --> 00:46:40.014
To get the sights and the sounds tastes and colors, of the places I visit.
00:46:40.445 --> 00:46:45.965
I also do a lot of academic research, a lot of online research.
00:46:46.485 --> 00:46:51.320
it is a balancing act, but I'm never.
00:46:51.945 --> 00:46:56.985
Besieged by concerns about which thing has the priority.
00:46:56.985 --> 00:47:00.974
For me, the emotional truth takes precedence.
00:47:01.405 --> 00:47:12.715
I've never been in a situation where I felt that there was a conflict between what I want to say and the historical truth, or what I want to say and the emotional truth.
00:47:12.764 --> 00:47:15.224
somehow I've managed to dodge that.
00:47:16.440 --> 00:47:20.039
Problem with balance, but I'm aware of it and conscious of it.
00:47:21.659 --> 00:47:24.179
So is your third novel, the one that just came out?
00:47:24.250 --> 00:47:24.449
Yes.
00:47:24.454 --> 00:47:31.735
So what were your other two and what was the history, those the first novel is based on a family story.
00:47:31.735 --> 00:47:33.175
It's called Even in Darkness.
00:47:33.534 --> 00:47:49.164
It is based on the life of my great aunt who is the only member of my maternal grandfather's family who did not escape Germany prior to the Holocaust.
00:47:49.735 --> 00:47:52.855
she wouldn't leave the country because her.
00:47:53.260 --> 00:47:55.599
Mother wouldn't go, my great-grandmother.
00:47:56.110 --> 00:48:05.449
And because her husband had been mustard gassed in World War I and was ill, if you were ill, you could not get an affidavit to come to this country.
00:48:05.880 --> 00:48:11.250
she wouldn't leave, her husband wouldn't leave her mother, so she stayed and she was a massage therapist.
00:48:11.639 --> 00:48:17.590
She ended up in a unusual relationship with a commandant at the concentration camp.
00:48:17.885 --> 00:48:39.284
she survived, kept everybody alive, her mother and her husband, and then lost everybody She fought to save, but went on to spend the rest of her life with a Catholic priest half her age in the most transcendent relationship I've ever seen in Germany for all of her remaining years.
00:48:39.764 --> 00:48:39.855
Wow.
00:48:39.855 --> 00:48:42.554
And I got to know and love this woman and the priest.
00:48:42.989 --> 00:48:46.349
And I thought, this is a very different Holocaust story.
00:48:46.349 --> 00:49:02.130
going back to what you said before about resilience, finding unexpected allies and being able to deal with unwelcome, unexpected events that happen to us, and then figuring out how to deal with it.
00:49:02.894 --> 00:49:06.074
she was the gold standard in my book.
00:49:06.184 --> 00:49:07.985
So I knew I had to write that story.
00:49:07.985 --> 00:49:11.375
And 85% of what happens in that book actually happened.
00:49:12.125 --> 00:49:21.034
My next novel is some people would say very loosely based on my own life, but it's a what if book.
00:49:21.304 --> 00:49:27.304
What if things about my own life and my own family had turned out very differently?
00:49:27.545 --> 00:49:28.715
What would that look like?
00:49:29.164 --> 00:49:29.644
I.
00:49:30.755 --> 00:49:37.054
Love hard apple cider and had a dream of actually producing it.
00:49:37.264 --> 00:49:38.704
So I made my character do that.
00:49:39.664 --> 00:49:42.155
And so the book, it's called Hard Cider.
00:49:42.184 --> 00:49:44.195
It's a novel, it's contemporary.
00:49:44.494 --> 00:49:56.255
It takes place in North Port Michigan, which is where we have a lake home, it's not historical, but heavily researched in the apple and hard cider production.
00:49:56.885 --> 00:50:08.074
it's a set piece for Northern Michigan Beauty and Lake Country that book had to come out and then I went back to historical fiction with Isabella's Way.
00:50:08.804 --> 00:50:12.074
they tell you you're supposed to create a brand and stick to it.
00:50:12.675 --> 00:50:14.230
Not so much in my writing life.
00:50:15.630 --> 00:50:16.320
Yeah.
00:50:16.369 --> 00:50:27.809
I love that you're taking us on this journey and what an incredible first novel Like so many things about it are contrary and it reminds me of my mother.
00:50:27.809 --> 00:50:35.139
when she was a child, her family was executed in World War I, as the Germans, moved through Belgium during the rape of Belgium.
00:50:35.199 --> 00:50:38.820
I don't know if you've ever heard of that, but Some people said it wasn't.
00:50:38.820 --> 00:50:41.489
I know it was because of what happened in my family.
00:50:41.860 --> 00:50:49.190
her family was hiding under a, aqueduct in Neff Belgium and the Germans were.
00:50:49.775 --> 00:50:56.795
On amphetamines, And the further they moved through Belgium, the more paranoid and violent they became.
00:50:56.804 --> 00:51:01.385
there was a crossing Right in front of my great-grandmother's house.
00:51:01.445 --> 00:51:03.514
Some of them survived, some didn't.
00:51:04.054 --> 00:51:16.585
The mother of, the five children was actually at my mother's wedding in France, these elemental family stories, we can talk about generational trauma, I believe in that.
00:51:16.585 --> 00:51:16.644
Yeah.
00:51:16.644 --> 00:51:31.945
But I also prefer to think of it that these are ways in which we form our own sense of who we are and where we came from, and it feeds our sense of our own identity in ways that I find very powerful.
00:51:31.945 --> 00:51:36.425
So I think, what you've just described is a perfect example of that.
00:51:36.954 --> 00:51:42.594
knowing those stories and transmitting those stories to me is extremely important.
00:51:43.579 --> 00:51:48.389
illustrating prompted me, this is the story of my heart, even in darkness.
00:51:48.960 --> 00:51:51.659
Because it informed who I've become as a person.
00:51:52.469 --> 00:51:55.739
So this great aunt's brother, my grandfather.
00:51:55.835 --> 00:52:18.079
Was one of the most important people in my life, and he was so close to her even though they were separated by continents and years just observing that connection between the two of them and his stories about her stories about him trained me to think about people in really important ways.
00:52:18.199 --> 00:52:19.610
yeah, that's interesting.
00:52:20.039 --> 00:52:22.769
we both know we're both connected to history in that way.
00:52:22.769 --> 00:52:28.650
Everything you just said is, something that I've come to believe and think about as well.
00:52:28.650 --> 00:52:31.530
I think like you said, genealogical trauma.
00:52:31.869 --> 00:52:32.780
but I always think about.
00:52:34.045 --> 00:52:38.885
With genealogy all the near misses that had to happen for us to be here.
00:52:39.454 --> 00:52:47.715
I think that experience happened in my mother's family 25 years before World War ii, so then 25 years later we have World War ii.
00:52:47.894 --> 00:52:48.824
Where is my mother?
00:52:49.465 --> 00:52:56.764
gone to live with her great-grandmother right in front of the monument to the people that perished in that, execution.
00:52:56.764 --> 00:53:01.954
she's seven years old and she knows the story and oh my God, the Germans are coming again.
00:53:02.664 --> 00:53:06.505
her grandmother wouldn't leave, therefore her mother wouldn't leave Belgium.
00:53:06.655 --> 00:53:15.505
Finally the legend in the family is they got on the last train leaving Belgium, they end up in a place called Laro.
00:53:15.744 --> 00:53:21.824
France only to be occupied by the German military, shortly thereafter.
00:53:21.824 --> 00:53:26.054
So she's living in this town at the age of eight, my mom tells a story.
00:53:26.054 --> 00:53:29.295
She's eight years old, her brother is five.
00:53:29.625 --> 00:53:32.414
They don't have money, but they do love pastries.
00:53:32.414 --> 00:53:56.675
so go to the patisserie look in the window and dream about eating the pastries This, German soldier, and she always said there was a difference between the SS and, the plain German military, but there was a young German soldier, looked at them, walked into the, pastry shop, and when he came out, he gave pastry it shoots everything we believe about right and wrong, good and bad.
00:53:56.744 --> 00:54:04.574
that story always sticks with me and I'm always interested in that nuance, the gray areas of situations like this.
00:54:04.574 --> 00:54:06.014
And that's why I love that.
00:54:06.019 --> 00:54:06.139
to me.
00:54:06.710 --> 00:54:10.489
In my great aunt's story in Isabella's Ways.
00:54:10.760 --> 00:54:15.829
In that story, I focus on unexpected allies.
00:54:16.409 --> 00:54:25.010
we have these narratives that if you're Jewish, all Germans were bad, Because of what happened during the Holocaust, but that's not true.
00:54:25.019 --> 00:54:35.059
You never know where you find and the notion to identify where you can recruit allies when you're in trouble.
00:54:35.114 --> 00:54:43.179
If you let go of these preconceived notions and consider people for they really are and recognize.
00:54:43.764 --> 00:54:46.545
That, there are countless stories about that.
00:54:47.125 --> 00:55:02.534
a really important notion, especially where we are in our culture and politics today, to resist being in a silo of black and white, because nothing's black and white.
00:55:03.510 --> 00:55:06.070
And that's a really good example of that pastry.
00:55:06.199 --> 00:55:07.969
That's an unexpected ally.
00:55:08.030 --> 00:55:08.239
Yeah.
00:55:08.239 --> 00:55:11.269
That's how this started is you use that term.
00:55:11.269 --> 00:55:13.250
I like that unexpected ally.
00:55:14.369 --> 00:55:19.070
And I have thought a lot about my, family and.
00:55:19.405 --> 00:55:20.875
the underground resistance.
00:55:20.875 --> 00:55:36.474
There were several of those in my family during World War ii, and I have been thinking a lot about them since things have changed and the political landscape draw on their experiences and think about, well, what was that like for them?
00:55:37.764 --> 00:55:40.985
And I try to think bigger than.
00:55:41.764 --> 00:55:45.625
The narrow-mindedness that I'm kind of drawn to black and white.
00:55:46.344 --> 00:55:51.264
What connections do you see between the stories you tell and the world we live in today?
00:55:52.704 --> 00:55:53.545
Oh my goodness.
00:55:53.934 --> 00:55:54.925
Like I said before.
00:55:56.005 --> 00:56:13.135
I worked for 15 years on the board of a refugee welcoming, very fraught situation because Jewish Family Services started bringing Russian Jewish, Russian refugees into the United States.
00:56:13.585 --> 00:56:21.795
And then when that era ended, they were bringing Afghani and African and.
00:56:22.110 --> 00:56:28.829
Syrian refugees who were escaping persecution in those countries.
00:56:29.489 --> 00:56:35.670
And that was a little bit fraught for a Jewish community agency, but the agency had no problem with it.
00:56:36.329 --> 00:56:40.440
Some of the other people did it because it's the right thing to do.
00:56:40.539 --> 00:56:43.170
these people needed help We don't discriminate.
00:56:43.349 --> 00:56:53.250
my own parents were both refugees, so I was very involved in that.
00:56:53.800 --> 00:57:06.335
I started writing about this story of Isabella, and I had no idea when I started writing that book, the fraught situation I would.
00:57:07.380 --> 00:57:16.989
Recognize in our country for immigrants and refugees and the incredible politics around that.
00:57:17.429 --> 00:57:23.519
the reasons I started writing this story were meaning this girl jumped into my head.
00:57:23.820 --> 00:57:30.250
I knew that my maternal grandmother's family in the 17th century.
00:57:30.835 --> 00:57:37.224
Or actually into the 16th century had left Portugal because of the Inquisition and went to Hamburg, Germany.
00:57:37.474 --> 00:57:38.614
I didn't realize that.
00:57:38.614 --> 00:57:40.235
That is fascinating.
00:57:40.235 --> 00:57:51.304
So during COVID, I did your basic deep dive into ancestry.com and actually found my ancestor who was born in Portugal.
00:57:51.695 --> 00:58:02.375
In 1586 and died in Hamburg, Germany in 1640 I had already known my great-grandfather on that side was an armchair genealogist.
00:58:02.655 --> 00:58:11.824
I had this beautiful scroll in his handwriting my great-grandmother's family, there was a famous Portuguese name.
00:58:12.195 --> 00:58:13.364
was my grandmother's name.
00:58:13.755 --> 00:58:16.724
So I knew I had that background.
00:58:16.775 --> 00:58:40.144
when I did this bike ride, I wasn't thinking about that other than loosely But by the end of that bike ride, I had seen so many places and had learned so much about the expulsion from Spain and Portugal over a couple of centuries that I realized, this actually applies to me, and my family.
00:58:40.144 --> 00:58:43.324
So isn't that something how we're drawn to that history?
00:58:44.695 --> 00:58:45.474
it is.
00:58:45.474 --> 00:58:49.125
And I keep thinking, a selfish kind of.
00:58:50.025 --> 00:58:54.545
Personal journey But then I realize, no, this is iconic.
00:58:54.545 --> 00:59:02.405
This is the story of immigrants in so many different versions.
00:59:02.914 --> 00:59:11.090
It's the story of repression in so many different versions and this is just one of'em.
00:59:11.269 --> 00:59:17.039
So I felt like, this story has some importance globally.
00:59:17.039 --> 00:59:27.059
the reason I started writing this story is very different over the five or six years between when I started writing it and when I've published it.
00:59:27.559 --> 00:59:38.150
The world in the United States of America has changed so much regarding refugees and immigrants that the reason I started writing it and the circumstances.
00:59:38.719 --> 00:59:51.980
In which I'm bringing this book out this year, a book about refugees, a book with Jewish content, very different than what I thought I was writing about initially.
00:59:52.034 --> 00:59:56.735
I'm very aware of that shift and it's been kind of interesting.
00:59:57.994 --> 00:59:59.614
Yeah, it is interesting.
01:00:00.664 --> 01:00:04.264
I'm just relating on so many different levels as you talk.
01:00:04.315 --> 01:00:09.289
I read a book by Felipa Gregory called The Queen's Fool, Did you read that one?
01:00:10.255 --> 01:00:11.574
I love Felipe Gregory.
01:00:11.635 --> 01:00:12.414
Oh, so do I.
01:00:12.994 --> 01:00:19.135
that book got me really interested in the, Spanish Inquisition what happened to the Jewish people from Spain.
01:00:19.184 --> 01:00:22.074
I have a friend who is, Mexican.
01:00:23.119 --> 01:00:24.380
she did her DNA.
01:00:24.429 --> 01:00:28.889
it came out that one of her ancestors was Jewish from Spain.
01:00:29.130 --> 01:00:29.429
Oh yeah.
01:00:29.940 --> 01:00:37.719
And so I've been like, that has always made me curious that story, And it was deep in their past.
01:00:37.719 --> 01:00:42.139
And so this kind of, speaks to that, this history that you're talking about.
01:00:42.690 --> 01:00:50.949
And then of course we come full circle the whole, refugee, immigration, issue in our country around the world.
01:00:51.320 --> 01:00:52.130
come full circle.
01:00:52.130 --> 01:00:59.889
I think that's what makes the work relevant you talked earlier about the emotional truth, and I always start from that place too.
01:00:59.889 --> 01:01:03.289
What is, the emotional truth as I perceive it.
01:01:03.960 --> 01:01:07.980
But also that is the thing that makes the story relevant.
01:01:08.420 --> 01:01:10.824
the reader, the listener.
01:01:11.820 --> 01:01:14.070
can connect the dots back to today.
01:01:14.429 --> 01:01:16.320
I mean, that's everything right there.
01:01:16.719 --> 01:01:25.820
you definitely cover it all with, the new book, and everything you've said about it and how you've related it to, today, and I think that's important.
01:01:27.050 --> 01:01:27.320
Yeah.
01:01:27.630 --> 01:01:36.929
one of the things I realized is that I'm very interested in strong women characters, so all three of my books have strong women characters.
01:01:37.289 --> 01:01:50.400
life presents us with unpleasant, unexpected issues, and I'm very interested in how we deal with that.
01:01:51.150 --> 01:01:52.949
And how do we recruit allies?
01:01:52.949 --> 01:01:56.010
How do we recognize unexpected allies?
01:01:56.519 --> 01:01:58.230
And then where do we go with that?
01:01:58.289 --> 01:02:12.400
And so that's kind of a overarching theme in all my books and, Isabella's ways specifically about the refugee and escape I'm always interested, how do we deal with that?
01:02:12.744 --> 01:02:19.724
How do we move forward, in a way that is more positive than negative?
01:02:20.065 --> 01:02:24.375
how do we remain undefeated by those situations?
01:02:25.320 --> 01:02:34.809
as a reflection point, we both have family who have persevered through Unconscionable situations.
01:02:34.860 --> 01:02:39.269
that tells me I can persevere through this because they did.
01:02:39.840 --> 01:02:46.829
And yes, what I'm going through is nothing like they did and I have their DNA in me.
01:02:47.400 --> 01:02:50.309
one of the things that just blew me away.
01:02:50.820 --> 01:02:53.570
Is, some ridiculously high.
01:02:53.570 --> 01:03:12.824
And I don't wanna say it out loud because I'm not sure the number is 78%, but I'm not gonna, please don't hold me to that of Portuguese people have some Jewish DNA in their profile.
01:03:12.880 --> 01:03:28.409
In 1492, the expulsion from Spain of Jews and Muslims, many just crossed the border over into Portugal because they had not imposed the strictures of the Inquisition in the same way that the people in Spain did.
01:03:29.250 --> 01:03:33.719
and those people were converso, they were people who converted to Catholicism.
01:03:34.050 --> 01:03:35.789
Some did it.
01:03:36.614 --> 01:03:38.144
Truly and became Catholic.
01:03:38.144 --> 01:03:43.795
Some did it okay, I'm gonna pretend I'm Catholic, but really I'm gonna hold onto my Jewish heritage.
01:03:44.244 --> 01:03:54.465
But there was a tremendous assimilation of Jewish people into the Portuguese population, when I heard that statistic, I went, wow.
01:03:54.954 --> 01:03:58.264
you were talking about Mary Morris, who's a wonderful author.
01:03:58.684 --> 01:04:23.244
Who wrote a wonderful blurb for, Isabella's Way, wrote a book called Gateway to the Moon that talks about that recognition and discovery that so many people in the diaspora from Spain and Portugal came to the New world, Mexico, New Mexico, into the United States, had this.
01:04:23.889 --> 01:04:26.829
Sephardic Jewish background that no one knew about.
01:04:26.829 --> 01:04:39.019
These were all devout Catholics, but they discovered it and their mothers would be lighting candles in the basement on Friday night, and nobody knew why that happened, but they just did it.
01:04:39.469 --> 01:04:48.630
It was part of their family tradition, So there were these Jewish elements of their lives that they didn't understand were Jewish until we got DNA.
01:04:48.820 --> 01:04:54.400
when we did my mom's DNA, she wanted to have it done and didn't have long for this world.
01:04:54.400 --> 01:05:00.929
So we did her DNA and interestingly enough, some markers for Eskenazi Jew.
01:05:01.699 --> 01:05:03.829
she grew up Catholic and.
01:05:04.349 --> 01:05:12.280
their story isn't the Jewish story, but it is peripherally the Jewish story, it's the persecution story.
01:05:12.639 --> 01:05:37.550
What else do you want us to know about this history that I haven't as I've been on book tour it's fascinating to me how little most people know about the Inquisition, which started, in the 12th century and wasn't really put to sleep until 1830 something, I think 36 or 37.
01:05:38.239 --> 01:05:47.059
And it was such an important, issue throughout all of Europe and into the new world.
01:05:47.969 --> 01:05:54.900
I knew about it, but not as much as I learned about it when I researched Isabella's way.
01:05:55.440 --> 01:06:03.280
it's so interesting to me that that's an era of history that is less known.
01:06:04.130 --> 01:06:05.420
that was surprising to me.
01:06:05.474 --> 01:06:11.835
Perhaps it would be surprising to your listeners, how can we find more out about this history?
01:06:13.275 --> 01:06:15.255
I cover a lot of it in Isabel's Way.
01:06:15.255 --> 01:06:15.855
Read the book.
01:06:15.855 --> 01:06:28.875
And you know, have an author's note that sort of describes it, read Mary Morris's Gateway to the Moon, which follows, over centuries family that discovers their heritage.
01:06:29.414 --> 01:06:39.605
And there's an amazing book, by Ruth Behar called, across so many It's about four 12-year-old girls.
01:06:40.565 --> 01:06:47.315
Over the course of four different centuries, starting in the Iberian Peninsula and ending up in Miami.
01:06:47.505 --> 01:06:53.655
each of them experiences life as a refugee into the next era.
01:06:54.085 --> 01:06:59.244
going from the Iberian Peninsula, into Turkey, then Cuba and then Miami.
01:06:59.545 --> 01:07:05.094
there are a lot of stories about it, but I'm sure there are also a lot of histories about it.
01:07:07.094 --> 01:07:10.125
I'm curious about the pivot to writing for you.
01:07:11.275 --> 01:07:20.635
You said that the storytelling began because I had a grandfather who was an attorney in Berlin.
01:07:21.454 --> 01:07:44.494
he was born in 1892 and he escaped Germany in 1938 and ended up working for a paper box factory in Detroit, and then he got readmitted to the bar in Germany to do restitution work for people who'd lost.
01:07:45.389 --> 01:07:48.900
Their businesses, their property, their education, and their health.
01:07:49.360 --> 01:07:51.730
the German government gave restitution.
01:07:51.730 --> 01:07:56.860
he got readmitted to the bar and four times a year traveled from Detroit to Germany.
01:07:57.309 --> 01:07:59.110
He was an orator.
01:07:59.110 --> 01:08:00.159
a storyteller.
01:08:00.460 --> 01:08:09.400
an amazing, model for telling stories As grandchildren, we got a better dessert if we told him a good story.
01:08:10.039 --> 01:08:14.630
As a child, I was a very avid reader early on.
01:08:14.880 --> 01:08:19.229
I became a English teacher and a speech and language therapist.
01:08:19.470 --> 01:08:22.560
So I was teaching kids how to read and write.
01:08:22.560 --> 01:08:27.689
I was working with children who had challenges.
01:08:28.034 --> 01:08:33.314
Telling their stories, and I had to figure out what they need in order to communicate more effectively.
01:08:33.444 --> 01:08:36.324
my bucket list item was to write a novel.
01:08:36.324 --> 01:08:44.904
I retired and started writing after a 30 year career in education and working in hospitals with kids.
01:08:45.154 --> 01:08:47.074
I call it my encore career.
01:08:47.164 --> 01:08:48.005
And that's what it was.
01:08:48.034 --> 01:08:48.739
I loved my career.
01:08:48.795 --> 01:08:49.994
I was pretty good at it.
01:08:50.354 --> 01:08:57.685
I never dreamed I could have another career as satisfying and successful as that first one.
01:08:58.015 --> 01:08:59.784
I'm a very lucky person.
01:09:00.744 --> 01:09:02.814
So are you traditionally published?
01:09:04.960 --> 01:09:13.960
I am published by She Writes, press, all three of my books have been published by She Writes Press, which is a hybrid publisher.
01:09:14.500 --> 01:09:23.890
And that is kind of halfway, it's like a interim between self-publishing and traditional publishing.
01:09:24.250 --> 01:09:31.939
I invest upfront in my publication process, manuscripts are vetted and not everybody can publish.
01:09:32.390 --> 01:09:48.284
There's a requirement to achieve a certain level of, editing before your manuscript is accepted for publication, I get gorgeous cover design, internal book design.
01:09:48.810 --> 01:09:52.500
Most importantly, professional distribution.
01:09:52.500 --> 01:09:55.170
Like we're distributed right now through Simon and Schuster.
01:09:55.859 --> 01:10:07.119
we get good book distribution a beautiful book, and then we get a much greater percentage of royalties than people who publish traditionally.
01:10:08.050 --> 01:10:11.619
but we do our own publicity and marketing, or we hire people.
01:10:11.914 --> 01:10:29.604
When I first decided that I was gonna do more than print 50 copies of even in darkness and give it to my family and friends I realized I had something more globally relevant I found Brooke Warner, my publisher of She Writes Press, and I said.
01:10:29.993 --> 01:10:32.974
I wanna work with that person the rest is history.
01:10:33.944 --> 01:10:43.634
I'm really interested in the publishing and writing part because I'm just starting that journey and we can talk more about that.
01:10:44.654 --> 01:10:51.863
I have an imprint, Belgian Rabbit Publishing and, I'm gonna move forward with that.
01:10:51.863 --> 01:10:55.484
I do need an editor to do a final run of the book.
01:10:55.873 --> 01:10:56.548
So that's important.
01:10:56.904 --> 01:11:04.519
Finding an editor that you work well with that you feel comfortable with, that gets you and gets the book that's so important.
01:11:06.514 --> 01:11:07.743
where can we find you?
01:11:09.323 --> 01:11:14.583
I am on Facebook, Barbara Stark, Neiman my author page.
01:11:15.113 --> 01:11:29.203
And I have a pretty elaborate website@barbarastarkneman.com, the Neiman part is spelled N-E-M-O-N, That's a weird spelling of Neiman.
01:11:29.804 --> 01:11:43.264
And I'm on Instagram, I'm on threads, and dipping my toe into TikTok, I will link out to your website and all those places in the show notes.
01:11:43.963 --> 01:11:47.083
is there anything that I didn't ask you that you wanted to say?
01:11:47.953 --> 01:11:48.854
No.
01:11:48.854 --> 01:11:53.024
You've asked me all the important questions and thank you for doing that.
01:11:53.953 --> 01:12:09.703
Well, thank you for being here and sharing this important history and your process I connect to pretty much everything you talked about, about your craft and how you link into it through history, through this idea of emotional truth.
01:12:09.703 --> 01:12:15.764
And you know, I really connect with that and I so appreciate you and what you're doing and how you're doing it.
01:12:16.583 --> 01:12:18.054
Thank you so much Anne-Marie.
01:12:18.173 --> 01:12:22.163
There is one more thing, which is I love doing book clubs.
01:12:22.689 --> 01:12:30.088
So if any of your listeners have book clubs that they'd be interested in, having, any one of my books.
01:12:30.139 --> 01:12:34.458
I do zoom into book clubs and if I'm local, I come to book clubs.
01:12:34.819 --> 01:12:45.219
I know I immediately thought of my, partner's stepmother who I just visited for her 80th birthday and, her book club buddies were there talking about books.
01:12:45.219 --> 01:12:46.628
This would be a good book for them.
01:12:46.628 --> 01:12:51.048
They love to read books about, women and strong women in particular.
01:12:51.738 --> 01:12:52.849
I'll let her know about it.
01:12:52.849 --> 01:12:52.969
Great.
01:12:53.588 --> 01:12:56.689
Thank you thank you so much, Anne-Marie.
01:12:56.689 --> 01:12:58.698
This was really delightful.
01:12:59.238 --> 01:13:00.918
Thank you for being here, Barbara.
01:13:01.038 --> 01:13:02.899
I really enjoyed our conversation.
01:13:11.088 --> 01:13:19.309
That was my conversation with Barbara Stark, Neiman author of Isabella's Way, even in darkness and hard cider.
01:13:19.788 --> 01:13:24.198
What stayed with me after this interview is how deeply personal history really is.
01:13:24.469 --> 01:13:32.298
How stories of migration, persecution, survival, and unexpected kindness don't stay neatly in the past.
01:13:32.658 --> 01:13:38.328
They live in families, they live in memory, and sometimes they surface years later as stories.
01:13:38.328 --> 01:13:38.623
We feel.
01:13:38.988 --> 01:13:47.269
Compelled to tell Barbara's work reminds us that history isn't just dates and events, it's emotional truth.
01:13:47.988 --> 01:13:57.559
It's the choices people make under impossible circumstances, and it's the quiet ways resilience gets passed down, whether we're aware of it or not.
01:13:58.354 --> 01:14:05.524
You'll find links to Barbara's books, her website, and her availability for book clubs in the show notes.
01:14:16.409 --> 01:14:19.289
Thanks for spending time with me on Armchair Historians.
01:14:19.439 --> 01:14:26.520
If you enjoyed this episode, the easiest way to support the show is to follow or subscribe, so you never miss an episode.
01:14:27.449 --> 01:14:47.699
And if you can leave a rating or review or share the episode with a friend who loves history, you'll find my website and links to everything we discussed in the show notes, along with ways to support the show more directly, whether that's joining the community, supporting financially, or simply helping more listeners to discover the podcast.
01:14:47.970 --> 01:14:49.050
And don't forget.
01:14:49.125 --> 01:14:58.814
The show notes also include a free short story download that introduces readers to bedlam from my soon to be released historical fiction series.
01:14:59.295 --> 01:15:04.784
Until next time, keep asking questions because history is anything but finished.
00:00:02.000 --> 00:00:02.689
Hello fellow.
00:00:02.689 --> 00:00:04.129
I'm chair Historians.
00:00:04.370 --> 00:00:05.480
Welcome to the show.
00:00:05.959 --> 00:00:13.314
I'm Anne-Marie Cannon, your host, historical fiction author, and curious soul, always chasing the human side of history.
00:00:14.169 --> 00:00:28.000
Show notes include my website, links to content discussed in the episode, how to support the show, and a free short story download that introduces readers to bedlam from my soon to be released historical fiction series.
00:00:28.870 --> 00:00:40.270
On this podcast, my guests share the history they love most and we experience it through their eyes, what fascinates them, what they've uncovered, and why the story still matters.
00:00:41.320 --> 00:00:42.310
Let's get into it.
00:00:44.310 --> 00:00:46.380
Hello fellow armchair historians.
00:00:46.649 --> 00:00:51.450
I'm your host Anne-Marie Cannon, and today I'm joined by author Barbara Stark.
00:00:51.450 --> 00:01:00.030
Neiman Barbara's work spans centuries and borders from 20th century Germany shaped by war and displacement.
00:01:00.420 --> 00:01:06.390
To the perilous world of the Inquisition in Portugal, Spain, France, and Germany.
00:01:06.750 --> 00:01:18.450
Her newest novel Isabella's Way follows a 14-year-old girl navigating faith, identity, and survival through a clandestine network of safe houses.
00:01:18.840 --> 00:01:23.575
What Barbara describes as a 17th century version of the Underground Railroad.
00:01:24.540 --> 00:01:33.120
In this conversation we talk about history, learn through story, inherited memory, and what it means to search for emotional truth.
00:01:33.120 --> 00:01:44.099
Inside historical fact, we explore refugees and resistance, unexpected allies, and the powerful ways family histories echo forward into the present.
00:01:44.579 --> 00:01:50.430
So settle in because this episode reminds us that history is never just about the past.
00:01:52.430 --> 00:01:55.159
Barbara Stark, Neiman, thanks for joining us today.
00:01:55.159 --> 00:01:57.079
Welcome to Armchair Historians.
00:01:57.980 --> 00:01:59.150
Thank you, Annmarie.
00:01:59.209 --> 00:02:06.079
And as I said to you previously, I am so delighted to have found you and found armchair historians.
00:02:06.629 --> 00:02:13.270
I have been haunting listening and enjoying this podcast, so thanks for doing it.
00:02:13.340 --> 00:02:19.340
interview Barbar Stark-Nemon Tue 0857[00:00:00] Anne Marie: Barbara Stark, thanks for joining us today.
00:02:19.340 --> 00:02:20.939
Welcome to Armchair Historians.
00:02:20.939 --> 00:02:22.539
Barbara: Thank you, Annmarie.
00:02:22.539 --> 00:02:30.139
And as I said to you previously, I am so delighted to have found you and found armchair historians.
00:02:30.139 --> 00:02:36.539
~And~I have been haunting~and~listening and enjoying this podcast, so thanks for doing it.
00:02:36.539 --> 00:02:37.340
Thank you.
00:02:37.340 --> 00:02:38.939
Barbara: I appreciate that.
00:02:38.939 --> 00:02:51.740
And you know, we connected on a Facebook page for authors and I just, I knew right away, like I had two people reach out to me that are historical fiction writers.
00:02:51.740 --> 00:02:53.740
You were one of'em.
00:02:53.740 --> 00:02:58.539
And I was like, oh my God, this is a perfect match.
00:02:58.539 --> 00:03:00.139
I'm really excited to.
00:03:00.139 --> 00:03:10.139
Go on your journey with you about history~and, um, as I said earlier,~the first thing I ask is, what is your favorite history?
00:03:10.139 --> 00:03:18.939
Barbara:~And~as I responded to you,~um,~my favorite history is~actually~whatever I'm working on in my historical fiction journey.
00:03:18.939 --> 00:03:20.139
I love stories.
00:03:20.139 --> 00:03:24.539
[00:01:00] As a way to learn about particular areas of history.
00:03:24.539 --> 00:03:35.340
So I have done a deep dive into the experience of Germans in pre-World War I, into World War II and after World War II in Germany.
00:03:35.340 --> 00:03:44.139
Barbara: And I also now, my latest book takes place in 17th century,~which is~Inquisition era, Portugal, Spain, France, and Germany.
00:03:44.139 --> 00:03:56.539
So I've done deep dives into those periods, but pretty much I can engage with a story in any era and really love and learn more about it through those stories.
00:03:56.539 --> 00:04:00.939
~So~I have two questions, but I'll start with,~uh,~what.
00:04:00.939 --> 00:04:11.340
Anne Marie: Attracted you to the history of the book that you're working on right now, which maybe you could tell us the name of it.
00:04:11.340 --> 00:04:12.939
Is it out yet?
00:04:12.939 --> 00:04:14.939
When is it coming out?
00:04:14.939 --> 00:04:18.139
Tell us a little bit[about that history.
00:04:18.139 --> 00:04:24.139
~So~my current novel is called Isabella's Way,~a novel~it released on September 16th.
00:04:24.139 --> 00:04:25.339
~So it's new.
00:04:25.339 --> 00:04:29.740
~I'm,~as we speak~on book tour with it and it.
00:04:29.740 --> 00:04:46.540
Anne Marie: Is the story of a 14-year-old embroidery who must find her way out of Inquisition era Portugal~and find her way to,~through Spain and France~and~into,~um,~Germany in order to escape the inquisitors that are chasing her.
00:04:46.540 --> 00:04:49.339
~Uh,~she does not understand that her.
00:04:49.339 --> 00:04:59.740
Embroidery is being used by a clandestine network of safe houses, the 17th century version of an underground railroad,~in order~to signal safety or danger.
00:04:59.740 --> 00:05:10.540
Anne Marie: She also does not understand that she is not the good Catholic girl, that she was raised to believe that she was, that there's a.
00:05:10.540 --> 00:05:17.740
Different identity, a[Jewish identity, of her family, and~that~that's why she has to make this escape.
00:05:17.740 --> 00:05:21.740
~So~these things emerge over the course of the novel.
00:05:21.740 --> 00:05:22.939
Why this history?
00:05:22.939 --> 00:05:26.139
Anne Marie: So why this and why now?
00:05:26.139 --> 00:05:27.339
~This particular history.
00:05:27.339 --> 00:05:30.139
So,~Isabella came to me in 2011.
00:05:30.139 --> 00:05:37.740
I was on a kind of warrior woman bicycle trip from, Lisbon, Portugal to the Alhambra in Granada, Spain.
00:05:37.740 --> 00:05:41.339
We'd had some serious medical issues in our family.
00:05:41.339 --> 00:05:44.540
My husband was supposed to be with me.
00:05:44.540 --> 00:05:48.540
~Um,~he wasn't because he couldn't travel at that time.
00:05:48.540 --> 00:05:51.339
Anne Marie: My son was in Madrid.
00:05:51.339 --> 00:05:53.339
I wanted to visit him.
00:05:53.339 --> 00:06:13.339
we wanted to do this bike trip, so I did the bike trip There's a wonderful story, which I won't go into the whole thing about a Celtic standing stone circle and my writing down from this very challenging climb, and~this girl,~this 14-year-old[girl popped into my head.
00:06:13.339 --> 00:06:19.740
Anne Marie: I was in the middle of writing my first historical novel, even in darkness.
00:06:19.740 --> 00:06:22.540
I knew I had a second novel.
00:06:22.540 --> 00:06:23.740
In the pike.
00:06:23.740 --> 00:06:28.939
So I said, you need to wait because I can't do you now.
00:06:28.939 --> 00:06:34.139
And she did wait, through the writing and publication of two previous novels.
00:06:34.139 --> 00:06:41.339
~And~I served on the board of Jewish Family Services in my local community, which is the primary.
00:06:41.339 --> 00:06:52.939
Anne Marie: Agency that welcomes refugees into our county from all over the world,~and~I was very involved in~doing~strategic planning and in fundraising and so forth.
00:06:52.939 --> 00:07:00.540
My own two parents were refugees from Germany to the United States prior to World War II as teenagers.
00:07:00.540 --> 00:07:02.540
So the whole refugee concept.
00:07:02.540 --> 00:07:12.139
Is part of my DNA and part of my[choices, to use my skills~on behalf of, you know,~as a volunteer in agencies.
00:07:12.139 --> 00:07:28.540
Anne Marie: And then this girl popped into my head, and then to round it all off, I'm a fiber artist and so I was connected to all the embroidery that I saw, in that bike trip as we explored different.
00:07:28.540 --> 00:07:31.339
~Uh,~communities and the cultures surrounding them.
00:07:31.339 --> 00:07:48.139
So those things all conspired to make me do two more trips to the Iberian Peninsula, France, in Germany to actually trace the root of my characters as they made their way,~um, to,~to,~you know,~the end of the story.
00:07:48.139 --> 00:07:49.339
Anne Marie: Wow.
00:07:49.339 --> 00:07:50.540
I love that.
00:07:50.540 --> 00:07:53.740
That's how I connect to history as well.
00:07:53.740 --> 00:08:03.740
Travel and,~um,~family, you know, there's a family connection to pretty much everything that I do as far as writing and documentary,~uh,~filmmaking.
00:08:03.740 --> 00:08:04.540
Same, same.
00:08:04.540 --> 00:08:05.339
I know.
00:08:05.339 --> 00:08:12.540
That's why I was so[excited to see and read about all of the things that you're doing.
00:08:12.540 --> 00:08:26.139
Anne Marie:~So then I forgot the other question that came into my mind, but it'll pop back in~both of your novels weave together the personal and historical trauma with resilience and hope.
00:08:26.139 --> 00:08:29.740
How do you balance emotional truth with historical accuracy?
00:08:29.740 --> 00:08:31.740
Oh, I love that question.
00:08:31.740 --> 00:08:32.940
If I don't.
00:08:32.940 --> 00:08:35.340
Center myself around the emotional truth.
00:08:35.340 --> 00:08:44.139
I'm not writing the way I want to, so the emotional truth is at the center of my writing about these things.
00:08:44.139 --> 00:08:50.940
That said, I'm a bit of a stickler~and I, as I know many of your guests.
00:08:50.940 --> 00:08:54.940
Have declared this and I will declare it as well.
00:08:54.940 --> 00:09:01.740
~I love the research part of the books that I write, so I do the historical piece.
00:09:01.740 --> 00:09:11.340
Anne Marie: I very dedicated to doing[the research and I'm fortunate enough to be able to do the kind of traveling I've done.
00:09:11.340 --> 00:09:18.940
To get the sights and the sounds~and the~tastes and~the~colors, of the places~that~I visit.
00:09:18.940 --> 00:09:24.539
~But~I also do a lot of academic research, a lot of online research.
00:09:24.539 --> 00:09:28.940
Anne Marie:~And~it is a balancing act, but I'm never.
00:09:28.940 --> 00:09:32.539
Besieged by concerns about which thing has the priority.
00:09:32.539 --> 00:09:35.340
For me, the emotional truth takes precedence.
00:09:35.340 --> 00:09:49.340
~And~I've never been in a situation where I felt that there was a conflict between what I want to say and the historical truth, or what I want to say and the emotional truth.
00:09:49.340 --> 00:09:52.940
Anne Marie:~So~somehow I've managed to dodge that.
00:09:52.940 --> 00:09:58.539
Problem with balance, but I'm aware of it and~I'm, I'm~conscious of it.
00:09:58.539 --> 00:10:04.139
So~you this,~is this your third novel, the one that just came[out?
00:10:04.139 --> 00:10:04.539
~Yes.
00:10:04.539 --> 00:10:04.940
~Yes.
00:10:04.940 --> 00:10:10.139
So what were your other two and what was the history, those histories?
00:10:10.139 --> 00:10:10.940
~Excuse me.
00:10:10.940 --> 00:10:14.940
So~the first novel is based on a family story.
00:10:14.940 --> 00:10:17.740
Anne Marie: It's called Even in Darkness.
00:10:17.740 --> 00:10:30.139
It is based on the life of my great aunt who is the only member of~my grandfather's,~my maternal grandfather's family who did not escape Germany prior to the Holocaust.
00:10:30.139 --> 00:10:33.340
~And~she wouldn't leave the country because her.
00:10:33.340 --> 00:10:35.340
Mother wouldn't go, my great-grandmother.
00:10:35.340 --> 00:10:47.740
And because her husband had been mustard gassed in World War I and was ill,~and~if you were ill, you could not get an affidavit to come to this country.
00:10:47.740 --> 00:10:56.139
Anne Marie: And she wouldn't leave, her husband wouldn't leave her mother, so she stayed and she was a massage therapist.
00:10:56.139 --> 00:11:02.539
She ended up in a unusual relationship with a commandant at Ian spot, the concentration camp.
00:11:02.539 --> 00:11:24.139
She survived, kept everybody alive, her mother and her husband, and then lost everybody She fought to save, but went on to spend the rest of her life with a Catholic priest half her age in the most transcendent relationship~that~I've ever seen in Germany for all of her remaining~a hundred~years.
00:11:24.139 --> 00:11:25.340
Anne Marie: Wow.
00:11:25.340 --> 00:11:30.139
And I got to know and love this woman and the priest.
00:11:30.139 --> 00:11:34.139
And I thought, this is a very different Holocaust story.
00:11:34.139 --> 00:11:50.539
~This is not, and I, again,~going back to what you said before about resilience,~about~finding unexpected allies and being able to deal with unwelcome, unexpected events that happen to us, and then figuring out how to deal with it.
00:11:50.539 --> 00:11:54.940
Anne Marie:~And~she was the gold standard in my book.
00:11:54.940 --> 00:11:58.539
So I knew I had to write that story.
00:11:58.539 --> 00:12:02.539
And 85% of what happens in that book actually happened.
00:12:02.539 --> 00:12:10.940
My next novel is some people would say[very loosely based on my own life, but it's a what if book.
00:12:10.940 --> 00:12:17.340
What if things about my own life and my own family had turned out very differently?
00:12:17.340 --> 00:12:20.139
Anne Marie: What would that look like?
00:12:20.139 --> 00:12:20.940
~And~I.
00:12:20.940 --> 00:12:25.740
Love hard apple cider and had a dream of actually producing it.
00:12:25.740 --> 00:12:28.539
So I made my character do that.
00:12:28.539 --> 00:12:31.740
And so the book, it's called Hard Cider.
00:12:31.740 --> 00:12:33.740
It's a novel, it's contemporary.
00:12:33.740 --> 00:12:48.139
It takes place in North Port Michigan, which is where we have a lake home,~and it's kind of my heart center, so~it's not historical, but heavily researched in the apple and hard cider production.
00:12:48.139 --> 00:12:55.740
Anne Marie:~And it's, it's,~it's a set piece for Northern Michigan Beauty and Lake Country~and so forth.
00:12:55.740 --> 00:13:03.340
And so~that book had to come out and then I went back to historical fiction with Isabella's Way.
00:13:03.340 --> 00:13:10.139
~So, you know,~they tell you you're~really~supposed to create a brand and stick to it.
00:13:10.139 --> 00:13:12.940
Not so much in my writing life.
00:13:12.940 --> 00:13:14.139
Anne Marie: Yeah.
00:13:14.139 --> 00:13:22.539
~No, I love that you're taking us on this journey and what an incredible first novel~that is an amazing story.
00:13:22.539 --> 00:13:29.340
~Like so many things about it are contrary and~you know,~it reminds me of my mother.
00:13:29.340 --> 00:13:33.340
~So~when she was a child,~what happened is, um.
00:13:33.340 --> 00:13:42.539
Her family, part of~her family was executed in World War I, as the Germans, moved through Belgium during the rape of Belgium.
00:13:42.539 --> 00:13:47.740
Anne Marie: I don't know if you've ever heard of that, but~Yes.
00:13:47.740 --> 00:13:49.740
~Some people said it wasn't.
00:13:49.740 --> 00:13:54.139
I know it was because of what happened in my family.
00:13:54.139 --> 00:14:04.940
~Uh,~her family was hiding under a,~um,~aqueduct in Neff Belgium and the Ger Well, one of the things with the Germans is that they were.
00:14:04.940 --> 00:14:17.740
On~an~amphetamines,~that's what kept that engine going for so long.~ Anne Marie: And the further they moved through Belgium, the more paranoid~they became~and~the more~violent they became.
00:14:17.740 --> 00:14:20.940
~And so,~there was a crossing~there where.
00:14:20.940 --> 00:14:24.940
~Right in front of~my grandmother's house,~my great-grandmother's house.
00:14:24.940 --> 00:14:36.539
~And my mom's great aunt lived on the other side of the road anyway, so they were executed basically.~ Anne Marie: Some of them survived, some~of them~didn't.
00:14:36.539 --> 00:14:43.340
The mother of,~uh,~the five children was actually at my mother's wedding in France,~but, um.
00:14:43.340 --> 00:14:47.340
So I'm making this a really long story about myself.
00:14:47.340 --> 00:15:00.139
I'm sorry, I just, I've gotten away with it, but what you're pointing out is that~these elemental family stories,~you know,~we can talk about generational[trauma, I believe in that.
00:15:00.139 --> 00:15:01.340
Anne Marie: Yeah.
00:15:01.340 --> 00:15:13.340
But I also prefer to think of it that these are~marker~ways in which we form our own sense of who we are and where we came from,~and.
00:15:13.340 --> 00:15:15.740
~What we need to move forward.
00:15:15.740 --> 00:15:23.340
~And,~and it feeds our sense~of,~of our own identity in ways that I find~very,~very powerful.
00:15:23.340 --> 00:15:29.740
So I think,~you know,~what you've just described~is,~is a perfect example of that.
00:15:29.740 --> 00:15:35.740
Anne Marie:~And~knowing those stories and transmitting those stories to me is extremely important.
00:15:35.740 --> 00:15:47.340
~So yeah, no, I think,~I think,~you know, you are~illustrating~what pro what not~prompted me,~but I is the story of my heart, even in darkness.
00:15:47.340 --> 00:15:47.740
~Mm-hmm.
00:15:47.740 --> 00:15:51.340
~Because it informed who I've become as a person.
00:15:51.340 --> 00:15:54.940
Anne Marie: So this great aunt's brother, my grandfather.
00:15:54.940 --> 00:16:06.539
Was one of the most important people in my life, and he was so close to her even though they were separated by continents and years~and so forth.
00:16:06.539 --> 00:16:18.139
And the, and~just observing that connection between the two of them~and, uh,~and his stories[about her trained me to think about people in really important ways.
00:16:18.139 --> 00:16:19.340
Anne Marie:~Um.
00:16:19.340 --> 00:16:24.940
Yeah, no, I think what you're saying is really relevant, so~yeah, that's interesting.
00:16:24.940 --> 00:16:30.940
~And I think that, we both know we're both connected to history in that way.
00:16:30.940 --> 00:16:37.340
Everything you just said is, something that I've come to believe and think about as well.
00:16:37.340 --> 00:16:44.139
Anne Marie: I think~that,~you can call it~the~trauma, like you said,~it is trauma.
00:16:44.139 --> 00:16:44.539
~Mm-hmm.
00:16:44.539 --> 00:16:45.740
always think about.
00:16:45.740 --> 00:16:52.139
With genealogy~is~all the near misses that had to happen for us to be here.
00:16:52.139 --> 00:16:52.539
~Yes.
00:16:52.539 --> 00:17:03.740
And~I think~that with, experience~that~happened in my mother's family 25 years before World War ii, so then 25 years later we have World War ii.
00:17:03.740 --> 00:17:06.140
Anne Marie: Where is my mother?
00:17:06.140 --> 00:17:15.740
~Uh,~gone to live with her great-grandmother right in front of the monument~that is there~to the people that perished in that, execution.
00:17:15.740 --> 00:17:16.140
~Wow.
00:17:16.140 --> 00:17:24.140
And so~she's seven years old and she knows the story and oh my God, the Germans are coming again.
00:17:24.140 --> 00:17:28.539
~And~her grandmother wouldn't leave, therefore her mother wouldn't leave Belgium.
00:17:28.539 --> 00:17:38.940
Anne Marie: Finally in, the[legend in the family is they got on the last train leaving Belgium, they end up in a place called Laro.
00:17:38.940 --> 00:17:43.740
France~and~only to be occupied by the German military, shortly thereafter.
00:17:43.740 --> 00:17:58.140
So she's living in this town at the age of eight,~and there's a story, and I am going back to what we first started talking about Anne Marie:~Kind of the nuance of these situations.
00:17:58.140 --> 00:18:00.539
But~my mom tells a story.
00:18:00.539 --> 00:18:03.740
She's eight years old, her brother is five.
00:18:03.740 --> 00:18:07.339
They don't have money, but they do love pastries.
00:18:07.339 --> 00:18:21.339
~And~so~they would go and basically their form of entertainment go, was to~go to the patisserie~and~look in the window and dream about eating the pastries~in there.~ Anne Marie:~And so.
00:18:21.339 --> 00:18:39.339
~This,~uh,~German soldier, and she always said there was a difference between the SS and,~uh, the plain German military, but there was a young German soldier, looked at them, walked into the, pastry shop, and when he came out, he gave~them both.
00:18:39.339 --> 00:18:48.539
Pastry you had bought~them both a pastry~and it's just~it shoots everything we believe about right and wrong, good and bad.
00:18:48.539 --> 00:18:58.140
Anne Marie:~Like~that story always sticks with me and I'm always interested in that nuance,~like,~the gray areas of situations like this.
00:18:58.140 --> 00:19:00.539
And that's why I love that.
00:19:00.539 --> 00:19:02.140
~Isn't that, go ahead.
00:19:02.140 --> 00:19:02.539
Sorry.
00:19:02.539 --> 00:19:03.339
I'm sorry.
00:19:03.339 --> 00:19:10.140
~It's~to me, I mean, I'm, I'm jumping in because this is~so[00:15:00] important to me.
00:19:10.140 --> 00:19:13.339
In my great aunt's story in Isabella's Ways.
00:19:13.339 --> 00:19:17.339
Anne Marie: In that story, I focus on unexpected allies.
00:19:17.339 --> 00:19:25.339
~Like~we have these narratives that~have developed around, our concept that,~if you're Jewish, all Germans were bad,~mm-hmm.
00:19:25.339 --> 00:19:29.740
~Because of what happened during the Holocaust, but that's not true.
00:19:29.740 --> 00:19:32.940
There were countless stories In my own family.
00:19:32.940 --> 00:19:36.940
Anne Marie:~You're talking about this story in your family.
00:19:36.940 --> 00:19:44.140
~You never know where you find notion to identify where you can recruit allies when you're in trouble.
00:19:44.140 --> 00:19:51.339
If you let go of these preconceived notions and consider people for whom they really are and recognize.
00:19:51.339 --> 00:19:54.539
That, and there are countless stories about that.
00:19:54.539 --> 00:20:09.740
Anne Marie:~It's just it, to me it's,~it's a really important notion, especially where we are in our culture and~in our~politics today,~is~to~really~resist being in a silo[because nothing's black and white.
00:20:09.740 --> 00:20:14.940
And~so~that's a really good example of that That's an unexpected ally.
00:20:14.940 --> 00:20:16.140
Anne Marie: Yeah.
00:20:16.140 --> 00:20:19.740
That's how this started is you use that term.
00:20:19.740 --> 00:20:21.740
I like that unexpected ally.
00:20:21.740 --> 00:20:22.140
Yeah.
00:20:22.140 --> 00:20:26.539
And I have thought a lot about my,~uh,~family and.
00:20:26.539 --> 00:20:29.339
~The resistors, the resistance,~the underground resistance.
00:20:29.339 --> 00:20:48.140
There were several of those in my family during World War ii, and I have been thinking a lot about them since things have changed and the political landscape~and I do, I~draw on their experiences and think about, well, what was that like for them?
00:20:48.140 --> 00:20:51.339
Anne Marie: And try to think bigger than.
00:20:51.339 --> 00:20:57.339
The narrow-mindedness that~really~I'm kind of drawn to is,~you know,~black and white.
00:20:57.339 --> 00:20:57.740
~Exactly.
00:20:57.740 --> 00:21:03.339
Let me look at my list here.~ Anne Marie:~Okay, here's a good one.
00:21:03.339 --> 00:21:10.140
~What connections do you see between the stories you tell and the world we live in today?
00:21:10.140 --> 00:21:11.339
Oh my goodness.
00:21:11.339 --> 00:21:12.940
Like I said before.
00:21:12.940 --> 00:21:23.740
[I worked for 15 years on the board of a refugee welcoming, very fraught situation because Jewish Family Services started bringing Russian refugees into the United States.
00:21:23.740 --> 00:21:30.539
And then when that~sort of~era ended,~and then~they were bringing Afghani and African and.
00:21:30.539 --> 00:21:35.740
Syrian refugees who were escaping persecution~that they were experiencing~in those countries.
00:21:35.740 --> 00:21:44.940
And~that, you know,~that was a little bit fraught for a Jewish community agency, but the agency had no problem with it.
00:21:44.940 --> 00:21:52.140
Some of the other people~did, but they~did it because~it,~it's the right thing to do.
00:21:52.140 --> 00:21:54.940
~You know,~these people needed help~and.
00:21:54.940 --> 00:21:56.140
~We don't discriminate.
00:21:56.140 --> 00:22:01.740
~So~my own parents were both refugees, so I was very involved in that.
00:22:01.740 --> 00:22:12.539
~And then~I started writing about this[story of Isabella, and I had no idea when I started writing that book, the fraught situation~that~I would.
00:22:12.539 --> 00:22:18.140
Recognize in our country for immigrants and refugees and the incredible politics around that.
00:22:18.140 --> 00:22:24.539
~So~the reasons I started writing this story were meaning this girl jumped into my head.
00:22:24.539 --> 00:22:30.539
I knew that~my own,~my maternal grandmother's family~I knew~in the 17th century.
00:22:30.539 --> 00:22:37.740
Or actually into the 16th century had left Portugal because of the Inquisition and went to Hamburg, Germany.
00:22:37.740 --> 00:22:39.339
Anne Marie:~Oh, wow.
00:22:39.339 --> 00:22:40.940
That's all I knew.
00:22:40.940 --> 00:22:41.339
Wow.
00:22:41.339 --> 00:22:41.740
Okay.
00:22:41.740 --> 00:22:43.339
~I didn't realize that.
00:22:43.339 --> 00:22:44.539
That is fascinating.
00:22:44.539 --> 00:22:53.740
So during COVID, I did your basic deep dive into ancestry.com and actually found my ancestor who was born in~a brunch,~Portugal.
00:22:53.740 --> 00:22:57.740
In 1586 and died in Hamburg, Germany in[1640~something.
00:22:57.740 --> 00:22:58.140
Wow.
00:22:58.140 --> 00:23:03.740
And I, had already known my great-grandfather on that side was an armchair genealogist.
00:23:03.740 --> 00:23:11.740
Anne Marie:~And~I had this beautiful scroll in his~gorgeous~handwriting of~my, of great-grandmother's family,~going way back.
00:23:11.740 --> 00:23:14.140
And so I knew that this.
00:23:14.140 --> 00:23:17.740
You know,~there was a~very~famous Portuguese name.
00:23:17.740 --> 00:23:19.740
~That was my grandmother's name.
00:23:19.740 --> 00:23:22.539
So I knew I had that background.
00:23:22.539 --> 00:23:40.539
~But you know, I did this bike ride, I wasn't thinking about that other than loosely~Oh yeah, I was somewhere there.~ Anne Marie: But by the end of that bike ride, I had seen so many places and had learned so much about that.
00:23:40.539 --> 00:23:53.339
Diaspora~that you know,~of the expulsion from Spain and Portugal over a couple of centuries that I realized,~huh, you know,~this actually applies to me,~you know,~and my family.
00:23:53.339 --> 00:23:57.339
So isn't that something how we're drawn to that history?
00:23:57.339 --> 00:23:59.740
Anne Marie:~It is,~it is.
00:23:59.740 --> 00:24:06.140
And I keep thinking,~you know, is this just sort of, you a selfish kind of.
00:24:06.140 --> 00:24:08.140
Personal journey~that I'm on.
00:24:08.140 --> 00:24:11.339
~But then I realize, no,[this is iconic.
00:24:11.339 --> 00:24:15.740
This is the story of immigrants in so many different versions.
00:24:15.740 --> 00:24:24.140
It's the story of repression~and~in so many different versions~it,~and~you know,~this is just one of'em.
00:24:24.140 --> 00:24:25.339
Anne Marie:~Mm-hmm.
00:24:25.339 --> 00:24:28.539
~So I felt like,~okay,~this story~has.
00:24:28.539 --> 00:24:30.539
It~has some importance globally.
00:24:30.539 --> 00:24:42.539
~And so, but~the reason I started writing this story is very different over the five or six years between when I started writing it and when I've published it.
00:24:42.539 --> 00:24:55.339
The world in the United States of America has changed so much regarding~this particular topic Anne Marie:~Of~refugees and immigrants that the reason I started writing it and the circumstances.
00:24:55.339 --> 00:25:08.940
In which I'm bringing this book out this year,~this time as~a book about refugees, a book with Jewish content, it's very different than what I thought I was writing about~or~initially.
00:25:08.940 --> 00:25:09.339
~Mm-hmm.
00:25:09.339 --> 00:25:15.339
And I,~I'm very[aware of that shift and~it's,~it's been kind of interesting.
00:25:15.339 --> 00:25:17.740
Anne Marie: Yeah, it is interesting.
00:25:17.740 --> 00:25:22.140
I'm just relating on so many different levels as you talk.
00:25:22.140 --> 00:25:29.740
~I, and I'm interested, I, read a book by Felipa Gregory called The Queen's Fool,~and it's about, yes.
00:25:29.740 --> 00:25:31.740
~Did you read that one?
00:25:31.740 --> 00:25:33.339
I love Felipe Gregory.
00:25:33.339 --> 00:25:34.940
Oh, so do I.
00:25:34.940 --> 00:25:43.740
~But~that book got me really interested in the,~you know,~Spanish Inquisition and,~yes.~ happened to the Jewish people from Spain.
00:25:43.740 --> 00:25:48.140
~And then~I have a friend~actually~who is,~um,~Mexican.
00:25:48.140 --> 00:25:50.539
~We did,~she did her DNA.
00:25:50.539 --> 00:25:56.140
~And so I love digging into that, people's DNA and ancestry and all that.
00:25:56.140 --> 00:26:03.740
And came out~in her family, she had no idea~that one of her ancestors was Jewish from Spain.
00:26:03.740 --> 00:26:05.339
Anne Marie: Oh yeah.
00:26:05.339 --> 00:26:10.140
And so that has always made me curious what was that about?
00:26:10.140 --> 00:26:12.940
~And it was deep in their past.
00:26:12.940 --> 00:26:19.339
And so this kind of,~you know,~speaks to that, this history that you're talking about.
00:26:19.339 --> 00:26:28.140
And then of course we come full circle and the whole,~um,~refugee, immigration, issue in our country really around the world.
00:26:28.140 --> 00:26:33.339
Anne Marie:~It just, it it can help but~[00:22:00] come full circle.
00:26:33.339 --> 00:26:44.539
And I think that's what makes the work relevant~is, you know, you,~you talked earlier about the emotional truth, and I always start from that place too.
00:26:44.539 --> 00:26:48.940
What is,~you know,~the emotional truth as I perceive it.
00:26:48.940 --> 00:26:54.140
But also that is the thing that~I think makes the story relevant.
00:26:54.140 --> 00:26:57.740
Anne Marie: Along with if, the reader, the listener.
00:26:57.740 --> 00:27:02.539
~Whoever it is, if they~can connect the dots back to today.
00:27:02.539 --> 00:27:05.339
I mean,~that,~that's everything right there.
00:27:05.339 --> 00:27:17.740
~And~you definitely cover it all with,~the book,~the new book, and~also~everything you've said about it and how you've related it to, today, and I think that's important.
00:27:17.740 --> 00:27:18.940
Anne Marie: Yeah.
00:27:18.940 --> 00:27:29.740
~You know,~one of the things I realized is that I'm very interested in strong women characters, so all three of my books have strong women characters.
00:27:29.740 --> 00:27:40.140
~I'm very interested that,~like I said before, life presents us with unpleasant, unexpected issues, and[I'm very interested in how~do~we deal with that.
00:27:40.140 --> 00:27:43.339
Anne Marie: And how do we recruit allies?
00:27:43.339 --> 00:27:45.740
How do we recognize unexpected allies?
00:27:45.740 --> 00:27:48.940
And then where do we go with that?
00:27:48.940 --> 00:28:00.140
And so that's kind of a overarching theme in all my books and,~you know,~Isabella's specifically about the~whole~refugee and escape~and that kind of thing.
00:28:00.140 --> 00:28:04.940
And I just,~I'm always interested, how do we deal with that?
00:28:04.940 --> 00:28:11.339
Anne Marie: How do we move forward, in a way that is more positive than negative?
00:28:11.339 --> 00:28:16.940
~You know, like~how do we remain undefeated by those~kinds of, of~situations?
00:28:16.940 --> 00:28:17.740
~I, yeah.
00:28:17.740 --> 00:28:24.539
And~as a reflection point,~I think that~we both have family who have persevered through~Yep.
00:28:24.539 --> 00:28:24.940
Just.
00:28:24.940 --> 00:28:25.740
~Unconscionable situations.
00:28:25.740 --> 00:28:32.140
~And~that~in and of itself~tells me I can persevere through this because they did.
00:28:32.140 --> 00:28:40.140
Anne Marie: And yes, what I'm going through is nothing like they did and I have their DNA in me.
00:28:40.140 --> 00:28:43.740
~Boy, we've gotten deep on this, haven't we, Barbara?
00:28:43.740 --> 00:28:48.940
Well, speaking of DNA,~one of the things[that just blew me away.
00:28:48.940 --> 00:28:50.940
Is,~uh,~some ridiculously high.
00:28:50.940 --> 00:29:05.339
And~I,~I don't wanna say it out loud because I'm not sure the number is 78%, but please don't hold me to that of Portuguese people have some Jewish DNA~in their,~in their profile.
00:29:05.339 --> 00:29:07.339
Anne Marie:~And it's because.
00:29:07.339 --> 00:29:24.539
~In 1492, the expulsion from Spain of Jews and Muslims, many, many, many just crossed the border over into Portugal because they had not imposed~all of~the strictures of the Inquisition~at the the same way that the people in Spain did.
00:29:24.539 --> 00:29:29.339
and those people were converso, they were people who converted to Catholicism.
00:29:29.339 --> 00:29:31.339
Anne Marie: Some did it.
00:29:31.339 --> 00:29:32.940
Truly and became Catholic.
00:29:32.940 --> 00:29:40.140
Some did it okay, I'm gonna pretend I'm Catholic, but really I'm gonna hold onto my Jewish heritage.
00:29:40.140 --> 00:29:48.940
But there was a tremendous[assimilation of Jewish people into the Portuguese population,~and~when I heard that statistic, I went, wow.
00:29:48.940 --> 00:29:57.339
~And then, you were talking about the,~I think it was your~Mexican person,~so~Mary Morris, who's a wonderful author.
00:29:57.339 --> 00:30:17.339
Anne Marie: Who wrote a wonderful blurb for, Isabella's Way, wrote a book called Gateway to the Moon that talks about that recognition and discovery that so many people in the diaspora from Spain and Portugal came to the New world, Mexico, New Mexico, into the United States, had this.
00:30:17.339 --> 00:30:20.539
Sephardic Jewish background that no one knew about.
00:30:20.539 --> 00:30:34.539
Anne Marie: These were all devout Catholics, but they discovered it and their mothers would be lighting candles in the basement on Friday night, and nobody knew why that happened, but they just did it.
00:30:34.539 --> 00:30:38.140
It was part of their family tradition,~you know?
00:30:38.140 --> 00:30:45.740
~So there were these[Jewish elements of their lives that they didn't understand were Jewish until we got DNA.
00:30:45.740 --> 00:30:46.940
Anne Marie:~Fascinating.
00:30:46.940 --> 00:30:47.339
Fascinating.
00:30:47.339 --> 00:30:55.339
we did my mom's DNA, she wanted to have it done and~she was,~didn't have long for this world.
00:30:55.339 --> 00:31:01.740
So we did her DNA and interestingly enough,~there,~there is, some markers for Eskenazi Jew.
00:31:01.740 --> 00:31:02.140
~Yep.
00:31:02.140 --> 00:31:06.140
Anyways, but you know, they,~she grew up Catholic and.
00:31:06.140 --> 00:31:14.940
~You know,~their story isn't the Jewish story, but it is peripherally the Jewish story,~so, well, it's,~it's the persecution story.
00:31:14.940 --> 00:31:16.140
Anne Marie:~Yeah.
00:31:16.140 --> 00:31:17.339
Yeah, for sure.
00:31:17.339 --> 00:31:23.339
~What else do you want us to know about this history that I haven't~asked?
00:31:23.339 --> 00:31:24.539
You know, it's.
00:31:24.539 --> 00:31:41.339
W~as I've been on book tour~now,~it's fascinating to me how little most people know about the Inquisition, which started,~I think~in the 12th century and wasn't really put to sleep until 1830 something, I think 36 or 37.
00:31:41.339 --> 00:31:48.539
Anne Marie: And it was such an[important, issue throughout all of Europe and into the new world.
00:31:48.539 --> 00:31:56.140
~And~I knew about it, but not as much as I learned about it when I researched Isabella's way.
00:31:56.140 --> 00:32:02.539
~But~it's so interesting to me that that's an era of history that is less known.
00:32:02.539 --> 00:32:04.940
~And~that was surprising to me.
00:32:04.940 --> 00:32:06.140
Anne Marie:~So.
00:32:06.140 --> 00:32:12.940
~Perhaps it would be surprising to your listeners, how can we find more out about this history?
00:32:12.940 --> 00:32:16.539
I cover a lot of it in Isabel's Way.
00:32:16.539 --> 00:32:17.740
~Read the book.
00:32:17.740 --> 00:32:18.940
Read the book.
00:32:18.940 --> 00:32:20.140
Read the book.
00:32:20.140 --> 00:32:34.539
And you know,~I, I, I an author's note that sort of describes it,~but~read Mary Morris's Gateway to the Moon, which you know, follows, over centuries of, you know, family that discovers their heritage.
00:32:34.539 --> 00:32:43.339
Anne Marie: And there's an amazing book, by Ruth Behar called,~uh~oh, I'm gonna forget the name, across so many Cs.
00:32:43.339 --> 00:32:45.339
It's about four[12-year-old girls.
00:32:45.339 --> 00:32:52.140
Over the course of four different centuries, starting in the Iberian Peninsula and ending up in Miami.
00:32:52.140 --> 00:32:57.339
~And~each of them experiences life as a refugee into the next era.
00:32:57.339 --> 00:33:04.940
Anne Marie:~You know,~going from the Iberian Peninsula,~I think~into Turkey,~and~then Cuba and then Miami.
00:33:04.940 --> 00:33:13.740
~And so~there are a lot of stories about it, but I'm sure there are also a lot of histories about it.
00:33:13.740 --> 00:33:18.940
Anne Marie:~Well, and~I'm curious about the pivot to writing for you.
00:33:18.940 --> 00:33:23.740
You said that~you, let me see, I have it here somewhere.
00:33:23.740 --> 00:33:24.140
Yeah.
00:33:24.140 --> 00:33:30.140
So,~the storytelling began because I had a grandfather who was an attorney in Berlin.
00:33:30.140 --> 00:33:46.940
~I mean,~he was born in 1892 and he escaped Germany in 1938 and ended up working for a paper box factory in[Detroit, and then he got readmitted to the bar in Germany to do restitution work for people who'd lost.
00:33:46.940 --> 00:33:50.539
Their businesses, their property, their education, and their health.
00:33:50.539 --> 00:33:52.940
~And~the German government gave restitution.
00:33:52.940 --> 00:33:59.740
~So~he got readmitted to the bar and four times a year traveled from Detroit to Germany.
00:33:59.740 --> 00:34:01.339
He was an orator.
00:34:01.339 --> 00:34:02.940
~He was~a storyteller.
00:34:02.940 --> 00:34:06.940
~He was a,~an amazing, model for telling stories~and.
00:34:06.940 --> 00:34:12.539
~As grandchildren, we got a better dessert if we told him a good story.
00:34:12.539 --> 00:34:15.739
Anne Marie:~And that was where it began.
00:34:15.739 --> 00:34:20.539
~As a child, I was also a very avid reader early on.
00:34:20.539 --> 00:34:25.739
And then I became a English teacher and a speech and language therapist.
00:34:25.739 --> 00:34:29.739
So I was teaching kids how to read and write.
00:34:29.739 --> 00:34:32.940
I was working with children who had challenges.
00:34:32.940 --> 00:34:41.739
Telling their stories, and I had to figure out what do they need in order to be able to communicate more effectively.
00:34:41.739 --> 00:34:48.539
Anne Marie:~So there's this through line, but~my bucket list[item was to write a novel.
00:34:48.539 --> 00:34:56.139
~So~I retired and started writing after a 30 year career in education and working in hospitals with kids.
00:34:56.139 --> 00:34:59.340
I retired in order to start writing books.
00:34:59.340 --> 00:35:01.340
So that's kind of It.
00:35:01.340 --> 00:35:03.739
I call it my encore career.
00:35:03.739 --> 00:35:05.739
And that's what it was.
00:35:05.739 --> 00:35:06.940
Your encore career.
00:35:06.940 --> 00:35:09.340
Anne Marie: I loved my career.
00:35:09.340 --> 00:35:09.739
~Yeah.
00:35:09.739 --> 00:35:12.139
~I was pretty good at it.
00:35:12.139 --> 00:35:20.139
I never dreamed~that~I could have another career~that would be~as satisfying and successful as that first one.
00:35:20.139 --> 00:35:22.940
~So here's my gratitude expression right now.
00:35:22.940 --> 00:35:24.940
~I'm a very lucky person.
00:35:24.940 --> 00:35:26.940
So are you traditionally published?
00:35:26.940 --> 00:35:36.539
I am published by She Writes, press, all three of my books have been published by She Writes Press, which is a hybrid publisher.
00:35:36.539 --> 00:35:37.739
Anne Marie: Mm-hmm.
00:35:37.739 --> 00:35:43.739
And that is kind of halfway, it's like a interim between self-publishing and traditional[publishing.
00:35:43.739 --> 00:35:47.739
So I invest upfront~for,~in my publication process,~it's.
00:35:47.739 --> 00:35:51.340
S~manuscripts are vetted and not everybody can publish.
00:35:51.340 --> 00:36:02.539
There's a requirement~to,~to achieve a certain level of, editing before~you know~your manuscript is accepted for publication, I get gorgeous cover design, internal book design.
00:36:02.539 --> 00:36:04.940
Anne Marie: Most importantly, professional distribution.
00:36:04.940 --> 00:36:08.539
Like we're distributed right now through Simon and Schuster.
00:36:08.539 --> 00:36:19.739
~Um, so~we get good book distribution~and we get~a beautiful book, and then we get a much greater percentage of royalties than people who publish traditionally.
00:36:19.739 --> 00:36:25.739
~Um,~but we do our own publicity and~our own~marketing, or we hire people.
00:36:25.739 --> 00:36:28.539
Anne Marie:~To help us with that.
00:36:28.539 --> 00:36:30.940
So it's kind of an interim.
00:36:30.940 --> 00:36:47.340
~When I first decided~to~that I was gonna do more than print 50 copies of even in darkness and give it to my family and friends~when~I[00:32:00] realized I had something~better and~more globally relevant~than that.
00:36:47.340 --> 00:36:52.940
found Brooke Warner,~who is~my publisher of She Writes Press, and I said.
00:36:52.940 --> 00:36:57.739
I wanna work with that person~and, um,~the rest is history.
00:36:57.739 --> 00:36:58.139
~Interesting.
00:36:58.139 --> 00:36:58.940
That's interesting.
00:36:58.940 --> 00:37:12.139
I'm,~I'm really interested in the publishing and~the~writing part because I'm just starting that journey and~I will, check it out or, you know, like~we can talk more about that.
00:37:12.139 --> 00:37:12.539
~Okay.
00:37:12.539 --> 00:37:19.340
Yeah, I have an imprint, Belgian Rabbit Publishing and,~you know,~I'm gonna move forward with that.
00:37:19.340 --> 00:37:26.539
Anne Marie: I do need~an~an editor~though~to do~like~a final run of the book.
00:37:26.539 --> 00:37:28.139
So that's~so~important.
00:37:28.139 --> 00:37:28.539
~Yeah.
00:37:28.539 --> 00:37:38.139
~Finding an editor that you work well with~and~that you feel comfortable with, that gets you and gets the book that's so important.
00:37:38.139 --> 00:37:40.539
Yeah, where can we find you?
00:37:40.539 --> 00:37:44.539
I am on Facebook, Barbara Stark, Neiman my author page.
00:37:44.539 --> 00:37:51.340
Anne Marie: And I have a pretty[elaborate website@barbarastarkneman.com, and the Neiman part is spelled N-E-M-O-N, because.
00:37:51.340 --> 00:37:53.739
That's a weird spelling of Neiman.
00:37:53.739 --> 00:38:03.340
And I'm on Instagram, I'm on threads, and~that's pretty much, I am~dipping my toe into TikTok,~but I'm really not there yet.
00:38:03.340 --> 00:38:04.139
You're brave.
00:38:04.139 --> 00:38:09.739
will link out to your website and all those places in the show notes.
00:38:09.739 --> 00:38:10.940
Anne Marie:~Um.
00:38:10.940 --> 00:38:18.539
Just, you know, one more time,~is there anything that I didn't ask you that you wanted to say?
00:38:18.539 --> 00:38:18.940
No.
00:38:18.940 --> 00:38:24.139
You've asked me all the important questions and thank you for doing that.
00:38:24.139 --> 00:38:30.139
Well, thank you for being here and sharing this important history and your process~and.
00:38:30.139 --> 00:38:32.940
You know, I can't say it enough.
00:38:32.940 --> 00:38:43.739
~I connect to pretty much everything you talked about, about your craft and how you link into it through history, through~uh,~this idea of emotional truth.
00:38:43.739 --> 00:38:53.739
Anne Marie: And you know, I~just~really connect with that and I so appreciate you and what you're doing and how you're doing it.
00:38:53.739 --> 00:38:55.739
[Thank you so much Anne-Marie.
00:38:55.739 --> 00:39:00.539
There is one more thing, which is I love doing book clubs.
00:39:00.539 --> 00:39:09.739
So if any of your listeners have book clubs that they'd be interested in,~um,~having,~you know,~any one of my books.
00:39:09.739 --> 00:39:16.940
Anne Marie:~But~I do zoom into book clubs and if I'm local, I come to book clubs.
00:39:16.940 --> 00:39:33.739
~So that, that was the one more thing I know I~just~immediately thought of my, partner's stepmother who I just visited for her 80th birthday and,~um, her, some of~her book club buddies were there~and they were, about books.
00:39:33.739 --> 00:39:36.940
This would be a good book for them.
00:39:36.940 --> 00:39:39.340
~I think they'd really appreciate it.
00:39:39.340 --> 00:39:44.539
~They love to read books about,~uh,~women and strong women in particular.
00:39:44.539 --> 00:39:44.940
~Yep.
00:39:44.940 --> 00:39:47.739
So~I'll let her know about it.
00:39:47.739 --> 00:39:48.139
Great.
00:39:48.139 --> 00:39:50.139
Thank you Anne Marie:~okay.
00:39:50.139 --> 00:39:52.539
And~thank you so much, Anne-Marie.
00:39:52.539 --> 00:39:54.139
This was really delightful.
00:39:54.139 --> 00:39:54.539
~Okay.
00:39:54.539 --> 00:39:56.940
~Thank you for being here, Barbara.
00:39:56.940 --> 00:39:58.940
I really enjoyed our conversation.
00:39:58.940 --> 00:39:59.570
Thank you.
00:39:59.570 --> 00:40:01.159
I appreciate that.
00:40:01.159 --> 00:40:10.300
And you know, we connected on a Facebook page for authors and I knew right away, like I had two people reach out to me that are historical fiction writers.
00:40:10.300 --> 00:40:11.230
You were one of'em.
00:40:11.559 --> 00:40:14.050
And I was like, oh my God, this is a perfect match.
00:40:14.300 --> 00:40:15.710
I'm really excited to.
00:40:16.260 --> 00:40:22.489
Go on your journey with you about history the first thing I ask is, what is your favorite history?
00:40:24.090 --> 00:40:32.750
as I responded to you, my favorite history is whatever I'm working on in my historical fiction journey.
00:40:33.409 --> 00:40:36.170
I love stories.
00:40:36.965 --> 00:40:40.324
As a way to learn about particular areas of history.
00:40:40.324 --> 00:40:52.594
So I have done a deep dive into the experience of Germans in pre-World War I, into World War II and after World War II in Germany.
00:40:53.045 --> 00:41:02.809
And my latest book takes place in 17th century, Inquisition era, Portugal, Spain, France, and Germany.
00:41:03.650 --> 00:41:19.550
So I've done deep dives into those periods, but pretty much I can engage with a story in any era and really love and learn more about it through those stories.
00:41:20.329 --> 00:41:23.219
I have two questions, but I'll start with, what.
00:41:23.684 --> 00:41:31.364
Attracted you to the history of the book that you're working on right now, which maybe you could tell us the name of it.
00:41:31.364 --> 00:41:32.385
Is it out yet?
00:41:32.445 --> 00:41:33.644
When is it coming out?
00:41:34.105 --> 00:41:36.054
Tell us a little bit about that history.
00:41:36.965 --> 00:41:43.344
my current novel is called Isabella's Way, it released on September 16th.
00:41:43.394 --> 00:41:46.054
I'm, on book tour with it it.
00:41:46.715 --> 00:42:05.179
Is the story of a 14-year-old embroidery who must find her way out of Inquisition era Portugal through Spain and France into, Germany in order to escape the inquisitors that are chasing her.
00:42:05.579 --> 00:42:09.929
she does not understand that her.
00:42:10.514 --> 00:42:22.284
Embroidery is being used by a clandestine network of safe houses, the 17th century version of an underground railroad, to signal safety or danger.
00:42:22.614 --> 00:42:31.025
She also does not understand that she is not the good Catholic girl, that she was raised to believe that she was, that there's a.
00:42:31.644 --> 00:42:38.744
Different identity, a Jewish identity, of her family, and that's why she has to make this escape.
00:42:38.875 --> 00:42:42.114
these things emerge over the course of the novel.
00:42:43.885 --> 00:42:45.264
Why this history?
00:42:46.675 --> 00:42:48.655
So why this and why now?
00:42:49.025 --> 00:42:52.054
Isabella came to me in 2011.
00:42:52.400 --> 00:43:02.340
I was on a kind of warrior woman bicycle trip from, Lisbon, Portugal to the Alhambra in Granada, Spain.
00:43:02.869 --> 00:43:06.739
We'd had some serious medical issues in our family.
00:43:06.739 --> 00:43:08.510
My husband was supposed to be with me.
00:43:08.940 --> 00:43:11.849
he wasn't because he couldn't travel at that time.
00:43:12.135 --> 00:43:13.619
My son was in Madrid.
00:43:14.019 --> 00:43:15.400
I wanted to visit him.
00:43:15.409 --> 00:43:32.480
we wanted to do this bike trip, so I did the bike trip There's a wonderful story, which I won't go into the whole thing about a Celtic standing stone circle and my writing down from this very challenging climb, and this 14-year-old girl popped into my head.
00:43:32.880 --> 00:43:37.320
I was in the middle of writing my first historical novel, even in darkness.
00:43:37.710 --> 00:43:39.690
I knew I had a second novel.
00:43:40.454 --> 00:43:44.565
So I said, you need to wait because I can't do you now.
00:43:45.074 --> 00:43:51.125
And she did wait, through the writing and publication of two previous novels.
00:43:51.635 --> 00:44:01.385
I served on the board of Jewish Family Services in my local community, which is the primary.
00:44:02.300 --> 00:44:13.820
Agency that welcomes refugees into our county from all over the world, I was very involved in strategic planning and in fundraising and so forth.
00:44:14.090 --> 00:44:23.269
My own two parents were refugees from Germany to the United States prior to World War II as teenagers.
00:44:23.300 --> 00:44:25.635
So the whole refugee concept.
00:44:26.449 --> 00:44:34.019
Is part of my DNA and part of my choices, to use my skills as a volunteer in agencies.
00:44:34.659 --> 00:44:47.375
and then to round it all off, I'm a fiber artist and so I was connected to all the embroidery that I saw, in that bike trip as we explored different.
00:44:47.724 --> 00:44:50.875
communities and the cultures surrounding them.
00:44:51.235 --> 00:45:08.264
So those things all conspired to make me do two more trips to the Iberian Peninsula, France, in Germany to actually trace the root of my characters as they made their way, to, the end of the story.
00:45:09.675 --> 00:45:10.065
Wow.
00:45:10.065 --> 00:45:10.755
I love that.
00:45:10.855 --> 00:45:12.925
That's how I connect to history as well.
00:45:12.925 --> 00:45:22.925
Travel and, family, you know, there's a family connection to pretty much everything that I do as far as writing and documentary, filmmaking.
00:45:22.925 --> 00:45:23.284
I know.
00:45:23.284 --> 00:45:28.264
That's why I was so excited to see and read about all of the things that you're doing.
00:45:30.824 --> 00:45:36.824
both of your novels weave together the personal and historical trauma with resilience and hope.
00:45:37.304 --> 00:45:41.864
How do you balance emotional truth with historical accuracy?
00:45:44.039 --> 00:45:45.525
Oh, I love that question.
00:45:46.844 --> 00:45:48.105
If I don't.
00:45:49.394 --> 00:45:53.025
Center myself around the emotional truth.
00:45:54.614 --> 00:46:06.614
I'm not writing the way I want to, so the emotional truth is at the center of my writing about these things.
00:46:07.244 --> 00:46:19.094
That said, I'm a bit of a stickler I love the research part of the books that I write, so I do the historical piece.
00:46:19.125 --> 00:46:34.155
I very dedicated to doing the research and for me, the research, as you suggested, does involve, and I'm fortunate enough to be able to do the kind of traveling I've done.
00:46:34.585 --> 00:46:40.014
To get the sights and the sounds tastes and colors, of the places I visit.
00:46:40.445 --> 00:46:45.965
I also do a lot of academic research, a lot of online research.
00:46:46.485 --> 00:46:51.320
it is a balancing act, but I'm never.
00:46:51.945 --> 00:46:56.985
Besieged by concerns about which thing has the priority.
00:46:56.985 --> 00:47:00.974
For me, the emotional truth takes precedence.
00:47:01.405 --> 00:47:12.715
I've never been in a situation where I felt that there was a conflict between what I want to say and the historical truth, or what I want to say and the emotional truth.
00:47:12.764 --> 00:47:15.224
somehow I've managed to dodge that.
00:47:16.440 --> 00:47:20.039
Problem with balance, but I'm aware of it and conscious of it.
00:47:21.659 --> 00:47:24.179
So is your third novel, the one that just came out?
00:47:24.250 --> 00:47:24.449
Yes.
00:47:24.454 --> 00:47:31.735
So what were your other two and what was the history, those the first novel is based on a family story.
00:47:31.735 --> 00:47:33.175
It's called Even in Darkness.
00:47:33.534 --> 00:47:49.164
It is based on the life of my great aunt who is the only member of my maternal grandfather's family who did not escape Germany prior to the Holocaust.
00:47:49.735 --> 00:47:52.855
she wouldn't leave the country because her.
00:47:53.260 --> 00:47:55.599
Mother wouldn't go, my great-grandmother.
00:47:56.110 --> 00:48:05.449
And because her husband had been mustard gassed in World War I and was ill, if you were ill, you could not get an affidavit to come to this country.
00:48:05.880 --> 00:48:11.250
she wouldn't leave, her husband wouldn't leave her mother, so she stayed and she was a massage therapist.
00:48:11.639 --> 00:48:17.590
She ended up in a unusual relationship with a commandant at the concentration camp.
00:48:17.885 --> 00:48:39.284
she survived, kept everybody alive, her mother and her husband, and then lost everybody She fought to save, but went on to spend the rest of her life with a Catholic priest half her age in the most transcendent relationship I've ever seen in Germany for all of her remaining years.
00:48:39.764 --> 00:48:39.855
Wow.
00:48:39.855 --> 00:48:42.554
And I got to know and love this woman and the priest.
00:48:42.989 --> 00:48:46.349
And I thought, this is a very different Holocaust story.
00:48:46.349 --> 00:49:02.130
going back to what you said before about resilience, finding unexpected allies and being able to deal with unwelcome, unexpected events that happen to us, and then figuring out how to deal with it.
00:49:02.894 --> 00:49:06.074
she was the gold standard in my book.
00:49:06.184 --> 00:49:07.985
So I knew I had to write that story.
00:49:07.985 --> 00:49:11.375
And 85% of what happens in that book actually happened.
00:49:12.125 --> 00:49:21.034
My next novel is some people would say very loosely based on my own life, but it's a what if book.
00:49:21.304 --> 00:49:27.304
What if things about my own life and my own family had turned out very differently?
00:49:27.545 --> 00:49:28.715
What would that look like?
00:49:29.164 --> 00:49:29.644
I.
00:49:30.755 --> 00:49:37.054
Love hard apple cider and had a dream of actually producing it.
00:49:37.264 --> 00:49:38.704
So I made my character do that.
00:49:39.664 --> 00:49:42.155
And so the book, it's called Hard Cider.
00:49:42.184 --> 00:49:44.195
It's a novel, it's contemporary.
00:49:44.494 --> 00:49:56.255
It takes place in North Port Michigan, which is where we have a lake home, it's not historical, but heavily researched in the apple and hard cider production.
00:49:56.885 --> 00:50:08.074
it's a set piece for Northern Michigan Beauty and Lake Country that book had to come out and then I went back to historical fiction with Isabella's Way.
00:50:08.804 --> 00:50:12.074
they tell you you're supposed to create a brand and stick to it.
00:50:12.675 --> 00:50:14.230
Not so much in my writing life.
00:50:15.630 --> 00:50:16.320
Yeah.
00:50:16.369 --> 00:50:27.809
I love that you're taking us on this journey and what an incredible first novel Like so many things about it are contrary and it reminds me of my mother.
00:50:27.809 --> 00:50:35.139
when she was a child, her family was executed in World War I, as the Germans, moved through Belgium during the rape of Belgium.
00:50:35.199 --> 00:50:38.820
I don't know if you've ever heard of that, but Some people said it wasn't.
00:50:38.820 --> 00:50:41.489
I know it was because of what happened in my family.
00:50:41.860 --> 00:50:49.190
her family was hiding under a, aqueduct in Neff Belgium and the Germans were.
00:50:49.775 --> 00:50:56.795
On amphetamines, And the further they moved through Belgium, the more paranoid and violent they became.
00:50:56.804 --> 00:51:01.385
there was a crossing Right in front of my great-grandmother's house.
00:51:01.445 --> 00:51:03.514
Some of them survived, some didn't.
00:51:04.054 --> 00:51:16.585
The mother of, the five children was actually at my mother's wedding in France, these elemental family stories, we can talk about generational trauma, I believe in that.
00:51:16.585 --> 00:51:16.644
Yeah.
00:51:16.644 --> 00:51:31.945
But I also prefer to think of it that these are ways in which we form our own sense of who we are and where we came from, and it feeds our sense of our own identity in ways that I find very powerful.
00:51:31.945 --> 00:51:36.425
So I think, what you've just described is a perfect example of that.
00:51:36.954 --> 00:51:42.594
knowing those stories and transmitting those stories to me is extremely important.
00:51:43.579 --> 00:51:48.389
illustrating prompted me, this is the story of my heart, even in darkness.
00:51:48.960 --> 00:51:51.659
Because it informed who I've become as a person.
00:51:52.469 --> 00:51:55.739
So this great aunt's brother, my grandfather.
00:51:55.835 --> 00:52:18.079
Was one of the most important people in my life, and he was so close to her even though they were separated by continents and years just observing that connection between the two of them and his stories about her stories about him trained me to think about people in really important ways.
00:52:18.199 --> 00:52:19.610
yeah, that's interesting.
00:52:20.039 --> 00:52:22.769
we both know we're both connected to history in that way.
00:52:22.769 --> 00:52:28.650
Everything you just said is, something that I've come to believe and think about as well.
00:52:28.650 --> 00:52:31.530
I think like you said, genealogical trauma.
00:52:31.869 --> 00:52:32.780
but I always think about.
00:52:34.045 --> 00:52:38.885
With genealogy all the near misses that had to happen for us to be here.
00:52:39.454 --> 00:52:47.715
I think that experience happened in my mother's family 25 years before World War ii, so then 25 years later we have World War ii.
00:52:47.894 --> 00:52:48.824
Where is my mother?
00:52:49.465 --> 00:52:56.764
gone to live with her great-grandmother right in front of the monument to the people that perished in that, execution.
00:52:56.764 --> 00:53:01.954
she's seven years old and she knows the story and oh my God, the Germans are coming again.
00:53:02.664 --> 00:53:06.505
her grandmother wouldn't leave, therefore her mother wouldn't leave Belgium.
00:53:06.655 --> 00:53:15.505
Finally the legend in the family is they got on the last train leaving Belgium, they end up in a place called Laro.
00:53:15.744 --> 00:53:21.824
France only to be occupied by the German military, shortly thereafter.
00:53:21.824 --> 00:53:26.054
So she's living in this town at the age of eight, my mom tells a story.
00:53:26.054 --> 00:53:29.295
She's eight years old, her brother is five.
00:53:29.625 --> 00:53:32.414
They don't have money, but they do love pastries.
00:53:32.414 --> 00:53:56.675
so go to the patisserie look in the window and dream about eating the pastries This, German soldier, and she always said there was a difference between the SS and, the plain German military, but there was a young German soldier, looked at them, walked into the, pastry shop, and when he came out, he gave pastry it shoots everything we believe about right and wrong, good and bad.
00:53:56.744 --> 00:54:04.574
that story always sticks with me and I'm always interested in that nuance, the gray areas of situations like this.
00:54:04.574 --> 00:54:06.014
And that's why I love that.
00:54:06.019 --> 00:54:06.139
to me.
00:54:06.710 --> 00:54:10.489
In my great aunt's story in Isabella's Ways.
00:54:10.760 --> 00:54:15.829
In that story, I focus on unexpected allies.
00:54:16.409 --> 00:54:25.010
we have these narratives that if you're Jewish, all Germans were bad, Because of what happened during the Holocaust, but that's not true.
00:54:25.019 --> 00:54:35.059
You never know where you find and the notion to identify where you can recruit allies when you're in trouble.
00:54:35.114 --> 00:54:43.179
If you let go of these preconceived notions and consider people for they really are and recognize.
00:54:43.764 --> 00:54:46.545
That, there are countless stories about that.
00:54:47.125 --> 00:55:02.534
a really important notion, especially where we are in our culture and politics today, to resist being in a silo of black and white, because nothing's black and white.
00:55:03.510 --> 00:55:06.070
And that's a really good example of that pastry.
00:55:06.199 --> 00:55:07.969
That's an unexpected ally.
00:55:08.030 --> 00:55:08.239
Yeah.
00:55:08.239 --> 00:55:11.269
That's how this started is you use that term.
00:55:11.269 --> 00:55:13.250
I like that unexpected ally.
00:55:14.369 --> 00:55:19.070
And I have thought a lot about my, family and.
00:55:19.405 --> 00:55:20.875
the underground resistance.
00:55:20.875 --> 00:55:36.474
There were several of those in my family during World War ii, and I have been thinking a lot about them since things have changed and the political landscape draw on their experiences and think about, well, what was that like for them?
00:55:37.764 --> 00:55:40.985
And I try to think bigger than.
00:55:41.764 --> 00:55:45.625
The narrow-mindedness that I'm kind of drawn to black and white.
00:55:46.344 --> 00:55:51.264
What connections do you see between the stories you tell and the world we live in today?
00:55:52.704 --> 00:55:53.545
Oh my goodness.
00:55:53.934 --> 00:55:54.925
Like I said before.
00:55:56.005 --> 00:56:13.135
I worked for 15 years on the board of a refugee welcoming, very fraught situation because Jewish Family Services started bringing Russian Jewish, Russian refugees into the United States.
00:56:13.585 --> 00:56:21.795
And then when that era ended, they were bringing Afghani and African and.
00:56:22.110 --> 00:56:28.829
Syrian refugees who were escaping persecution in those countries.
00:56:29.489 --> 00:56:35.670
And that was a little bit fraught for a Jewish community agency, but the agency had no problem with it.
00:56:36.329 --> 00:56:40.440
Some of the other people did it because it's the right thing to do.
00:56:40.539 --> 00:56:43.170
these people needed help We don't discriminate.
00:56:43.349 --> 00:56:53.250
my own parents were both refugees, so I was very involved in that.
00:56:53.800 --> 00:57:06.335
I started writing about this story of Isabella, and I had no idea when I started writing that book, the fraught situation I would.
00:57:07.380 --> 00:57:16.989
Recognize in our country for immigrants and refugees and the incredible politics around that.
00:57:17.429 --> 00:57:23.519
the reasons I started writing this story were meaning this girl jumped into my head.
00:57:23.820 --> 00:57:30.250
I knew that my maternal grandmother's family in the 17th century.
00:57:30.835 --> 00:57:37.224
Or actually into the 16th century had left Portugal because of the Inquisition and went to Hamburg, Germany.
00:57:37.474 --> 00:57:38.614
I didn't realize that.
00:57:38.614 --> 00:57:40.235
That is fascinating.
00:57:40.235 --> 00:57:51.304
So during COVID, I did your basic deep dive into ancestry.com and actually found my ancestor who was born in Portugal.
00:57:51.695 --> 00:58:02.375
In 1586 and died in Hamburg, Germany in 1640 I had already known my great-grandfather on that side was an armchair genealogist.
00:58:02.655 --> 00:58:11.824
I had this beautiful scroll in his handwriting my great-grandmother's family, there was a famous Portuguese name.
00:58:12.195 --> 00:58:13.364
was my grandmother's name.
00:58:13.755 --> 00:58:16.724
So I knew I had that background.
00:58:16.775 --> 00:58:40.144
when I did this bike ride, I wasn't thinking about that other than loosely But by the end of that bike ride, I had seen so many places and had learned so much about the expulsion from Spain and Portugal over a couple of centuries that I realized, this actually applies to me, and my family.
00:58:40.144 --> 00:58:43.324
So isn't that something how we're drawn to that history?
00:58:44.695 --> 00:58:45.474
it is.
00:58:45.474 --> 00:58:49.125
And I keep thinking, a selfish kind of.
00:58:50.025 --> 00:58:54.545
Personal journey But then I realize, no, this is iconic.
00:58:54.545 --> 00:59:02.405
This is the story of immigrants in so many different versions.
00:59:02.914 --> 00:59:11.090
It's the story of repression in so many different versions and this is just one of'em.
00:59:11.269 --> 00:59:17.039
So I felt like, this story has some importance globally.
00:59:17.039 --> 00:59:27.059
the reason I started writing this story is very different over the five or six years between when I started writing it and when I've published it.
00:59:27.559 --> 00:59:38.150
The world in the United States of America has changed so much regarding refugees and immigrants that the reason I started writing it and the circumstances.
00:59:38.719 --> 00:59:51.980
In which I'm bringing this book out this year, a book about refugees, a book with Jewish content, very different than what I thought I was writing about initially.
00:59:52.034 --> 00:59:56.735
I'm very aware of that shift and it's been kind of interesting.
00:59:57.994 --> 00:59:59.614
Yeah, it is interesting.
01:00:00.664 --> 01:00:04.264
I'm just relating on so many different levels as you talk.
01:00:04.315 --> 01:00:09.289
I read a book by Felipa Gregory called The Queen's Fool, Did you read that one?
01:00:10.255 --> 01:00:11.574
I love Felipe Gregory.
01:00:11.635 --> 01:00:12.414
Oh, so do I.
01:00:12.994 --> 01:00:19.135
that book got me really interested in the, Spanish Inquisition what happened to the Jewish people from Spain.
01:00:19.184 --> 01:00:22.074
I have a friend who is, Mexican.
01:00:23.119 --> 01:00:24.380
she did her DNA.
01:00:24.429 --> 01:00:28.889
it came out that one of her ancestors was Jewish from Spain.
01:00:29.130 --> 01:00:29.429
Oh yeah.
01:00:29.940 --> 01:00:37.719
And so I've been like, that has always made me curious that story, And it was deep in their past.
01:00:37.719 --> 01:00:42.139
And so this kind of, speaks to that, this history that you're talking about.
01:00:42.690 --> 01:00:50.949
And then of course we come full circle the whole, refugee, immigration, issue in our country around the world.
01:00:51.320 --> 01:00:52.130
come full circle.
01:00:52.130 --> 01:00:59.889
I think that's what makes the work relevant you talked earlier about the emotional truth, and I always start from that place too.
01:00:59.889 --> 01:01:03.289
What is, the emotional truth as I perceive it.
01:01:03.960 --> 01:01:07.980
But also that is the thing that makes the story relevant.
01:01:08.420 --> 01:01:10.824
the reader, the listener.
01:01:11.820 --> 01:01:14.070
can connect the dots back to today.
01:01:14.429 --> 01:01:16.320
I mean, that's everything right there.
01:01:16.719 --> 01:01:25.820
you definitely cover it all with, the new book, and everything you've said about it and how you've related it to, today, and I think that's important.
01:01:27.050 --> 01:01:27.320
Yeah.
01:01:27.630 --> 01:01:36.929
one of the things I realized is that I'm very interested in strong women characters, so all three of my books have strong women characters.
01:01:37.289 --> 01:01:50.400
life presents us with unpleasant, unexpected issues, and I'm very interested in how we deal with that.
01:01:51.150 --> 01:01:52.949
And how do we recruit allies?
01:01:52.949 --> 01:01:56.010
How do we recognize unexpected allies?
01:01:56.519 --> 01:01:58.230
And then where do we go with that?
01:01:58.289 --> 01:02:12.400
And so that's kind of a overarching theme in all my books and, Isabella's ways specifically about the refugee and escape I'm always interested, how do we deal with that?
01:02:12.744 --> 01:02:19.724
How do we move forward, in a way that is more positive than negative?
01:02:20.065 --> 01:02:24.375
how do we remain undefeated by those situations?
01:02:25.320 --> 01:02:34.809
as a reflection point, we both have family who have persevered through Unconscionable situations.
01:02:34.860 --> 01:02:39.269
that tells me I can persevere through this because they did.
01:02:39.840 --> 01:02:46.829
And yes, what I'm going through is nothing like they did and I have their DNA in me.
01:02:47.400 --> 01:02:50.309
one of the things that just blew me away.
01:02:50.820 --> 01:02:53.570
Is, some ridiculously high.
01:02:53.570 --> 01:03:12.824
And I don't wanna say it out loud because I'm not sure the number is 78%, but I'm not gonna, please don't hold me to that of Portuguese people have some Jewish DNA in their profile.
01:03:12.880 --> 01:03:28.409
In 1492, the expulsion from Spain of Jews and Muslims, many just crossed the border over into Portugal because they had not imposed the strictures of the Inquisition in the same way that the people in Spain did.
01:03:29.250 --> 01:03:33.719
and those people were converso, they were people who converted to Catholicism.
01:03:34.050 --> 01:03:35.789
Some did it.
01:03:36.614 --> 01:03:38.144
Truly and became Catholic.
01:03:38.144 --> 01:03:43.795
Some did it okay, I'm gonna pretend I'm Catholic, but really I'm gonna hold onto my Jewish heritage.
01:03:44.244 --> 01:03:54.465
But there was a tremendous assimilation of Jewish people into the Portuguese population, when I heard that statistic, I went, wow.
01:03:54.954 --> 01:03:58.264
you were talking about Mary Morris, who's a wonderful author.
01:03:58.684 --> 01:04:23.244
Who wrote a wonderful blurb for, Isabella's Way, wrote a book called Gateway to the Moon that talks about that recognition and discovery that so many people in the diaspora from Spain and Portugal came to the New world, Mexico, New Mexico, into the United States, had this.
01:04:23.889 --> 01:04:26.829
Sephardic Jewish background that no one knew about.
01:04:26.829 --> 01:04:39.019
These were all devout Catholics, but they discovered it and their mothers would be lighting candles in the basement on Friday night, and nobody knew why that happened, but they just did it.
01:04:39.469 --> 01:04:48.630
It was part of their family tradition, So there were these Jewish elements of their lives that they didn't understand were Jewish until we got DNA.
01:04:48.820 --> 01:04:54.400
when we did my mom's DNA, she wanted to have it done and didn't have long for this world.
01:04:54.400 --> 01:05:00.929
So we did her DNA and interestingly enough, some markers for Eskenazi Jew.
01:05:01.699 --> 01:05:03.829
she grew up Catholic and.
01:05:04.349 --> 01:05:12.280
their story isn't the Jewish story, but it is peripherally the Jewish story, it's the persecution story.
01:05:12.639 --> 01:05:37.550
What else do you want us to know about this history that I haven't as I've been on book tour it's fascinating to me how little most people know about the Inquisition, which started, in the 12th century and wasn't really put to sleep until 1830 something, I think 36 or 37.
01:05:38.239 --> 01:05:47.059
And it was such an important, issue throughout all of Europe and into the new world.
01:05:47.969 --> 01:05:54.900
I knew about it, but not as much as I learned about it when I researched Isabella's way.
01:05:55.440 --> 01:06:03.280
it's so interesting to me that that's an era of history that is less known.
01:06:04.130 --> 01:06:05.420
that was surprising to me.
01:06:05.474 --> 01:06:11.835
Perhaps it would be surprising to your listeners, how can we find more out about this history?
01:06:13.275 --> 01:06:15.255
I cover a lot of it in Isabel's Way.
01:06:15.255 --> 01:06:15.855
Read the book.
01:06:15.855 --> 01:06:28.875
And you know, have an author's note that sort of describes it, read Mary Morris's Gateway to the Moon, which follows, over centuries family that discovers their heritage.
01:06:29.414 --> 01:06:39.605
And there's an amazing book, by Ruth Behar called, across so many It's about four 12-year-old girls.
01:06:40.565 --> 01:06:47.315
Over the course of four different centuries, starting in the Iberian Peninsula and ending up in Miami.
01:06:47.505 --> 01:06:53.655
each of them experiences life as a refugee into the next era.
01:06:54.085 --> 01:06:59.244
going from the Iberian Peninsula, into Turkey, then Cuba and then Miami.
01:06:59.545 --> 01:07:05.094
there are a lot of stories about it, but I'm sure there are also a lot of histories about it.
01:07:07.094 --> 01:07:10.125
I'm curious about the pivot to writing for you.
01:07:11.275 --> 01:07:20.635
You said that the storytelling began because I had a grandfather who was an attorney in Berlin.
01:07:21.454 --> 01:07:44.494
he was born in 1892 and he escaped Germany in 1938 and ended up working for a paper box factory in Detroit, and then he got readmitted to the bar in Germany to do restitution work for people who'd lost.
01:07:45.389 --> 01:07:48.900
Their businesses, their property, their education, and their health.
01:07:49.360 --> 01:07:51.730
the German government gave restitution.
01:07:51.730 --> 01:07:56.860
he got readmitted to the bar and four times a year traveled from Detroit to Germany.
01:07:57.309 --> 01:07:59.110
He was an orator.
01:07:59.110 --> 01:08:00.159
a storyteller.
01:08:00.460 --> 01:08:09.400
an amazing, model for telling stories As grandchildren, we got a better dessert if we told him a good story.
01:08:10.039 --> 01:08:14.630
As a child, I was a very avid reader early on.
01:08:14.880 --> 01:08:19.229
I became a English teacher and a speech and language therapist.
01:08:19.470 --> 01:08:22.560
So I was teaching kids how to read and write.
01:08:22.560 --> 01:08:27.689
I was working with children who had challenges.
01:08:28.034 --> 01:08:33.314
Telling their stories, and I had to figure out what they need in order to communicate more effectively.
01:08:33.444 --> 01:08:36.324
my bucket list item was to write a novel.
01:08:36.324 --> 01:08:44.904
I retired and started writing after a 30 year career in education and working in hospitals with kids.
01:08:45.154 --> 01:08:47.074
I call it my encore career.
01:08:47.164 --> 01:08:48.005
And that's what it was.
01:08:48.034 --> 01:08:48.739
I loved my career.
01:08:48.795 --> 01:08:49.994
I was pretty good at it.
01:08:50.354 --> 01:08:57.685
I never dreamed I could have another career as satisfying and successful as that first one.
01:08:58.015 --> 01:08:59.784
I'm a very lucky person.
01:09:00.744 --> 01:09:02.814
So are you traditionally published?
01:09:04.960 --> 01:09:13.960
I am published by She Writes, press, all three of my books have been published by She Writes Press, which is a hybrid publisher.
01:09:14.500 --> 01:09:23.890
And that is kind of halfway, it's like a interim between self-publishing and traditional publishing.
01:09:24.250 --> 01:09:31.939
I invest upfront in my publication process, manuscripts are vetted and not everybody can publish.
01:09:32.390 --> 01:09:48.284
There's a requirement to achieve a certain level of, editing before your manuscript is accepted for publication, I get gorgeous cover design, internal book design.
01:09:48.810 --> 01:09:52.500
Most importantly, professional distribution.
01:09:52.500 --> 01:09:55.170
Like we're distributed right now through Simon and Schuster.
01:09:55.859 --> 01:10:07.119
we get good book distribution a beautiful book, and then we get a much greater percentage of royalties than people who publish traditionally.
01:10:08.050 --> 01:10:11.619
but we do our own publicity and marketing, or we hire people.
01:10:11.914 --> 01:10:29.604
When I first decided that I was gonna do more than print 50 copies of even in darkness and give it to my family and friends I realized I had something more globally relevant I found Brooke Warner, my publisher of She Writes Press, and I said.
01:10:29.993 --> 01:10:32.974
I wanna work with that person the rest is history.
01:10:33.944 --> 01:10:43.634
I'm really interested in the publishing and writing part because I'm just starting that journey and we can talk more about that.
01:10:44.654 --> 01:10:51.863
I have an imprint, Belgian Rabbit Publishing and, I'm gonna move forward with that.
01:10:51.863 --> 01:10:55.484
I do need an editor to do a final run of the book.
01:10:55.873 --> 01:10:56.548
So that's important.
01:10:56.904 --> 01:11:04.519
Finding an editor that you work well with that you feel comfortable with, that gets you and gets the book that's so important.
01:11:06.514 --> 01:11:07.743
where can we find you?
01:11:09.323 --> 01:11:14.583
I am on Facebook, Barbara Stark, Neiman my author page.
01:11:15.113 --> 01:11:29.203
And I have a pretty elaborate website@barbarastarkneman.com, the Neiman part is spelled N-E-M-O-N, That's a weird spelling of Neiman.
01:11:29.804 --> 01:11:43.264
And I'm on Instagram, I'm on threads, and dipping my toe into TikTok, I will link out to your website and all those places in the show notes.
01:11:43.963 --> 01:11:47.083
is there anything that I didn't ask you that you wanted to say?
01:11:47.953 --> 01:11:48.854
No.
01:11:48.854 --> 01:11:53.024
You've asked me all the important questions and thank you for doing that.
01:11:53.953 --> 01:12:09.703
Well, thank you for being here and sharing this important history and your process I connect to pretty much everything you talked about, about your craft and how you link into it through history, through this idea of emotional truth.
01:12:09.703 --> 01:12:15.764
And you know, I really connect with that and I so appreciate you and what you're doing and how you're doing it.
01:12:16.583 --> 01:12:18.054
Thank you so much Anne-Marie.
01:12:18.173 --> 01:12:22.163
There is one more thing, which is I love doing book clubs.
01:12:22.689 --> 01:12:30.088
So if any of your listeners have book clubs that they'd be interested in, having, any one of my books.
01:12:30.139 --> 01:12:34.458
I do zoom into book clubs and if I'm local, I come to book clubs.
01:12:34.819 --> 01:12:45.219
I know I immediately thought of my, partner's stepmother who I just visited for her 80th birthday and, her book club buddies were there talking about books.
01:12:45.219 --> 01:12:46.628
This would be a good book for them.
01:12:46.628 --> 01:12:51.048
They love to read books about, women and strong women in particular.
01:12:51.738 --> 01:12:52.849
I'll let her know about it.
01:12:52.849 --> 01:12:52.969
Great.
01:12:53.588 --> 01:12:56.689
Thank you thank you so much, Anne-Marie.
01:12:56.689 --> 01:12:58.698
This was really delightful.
01:12:59.238 --> 01:13:00.918
Thank you for being here, Barbara.
01:13:01.038 --> 01:13:02.899
I really enjoyed our conversation.
01:13:11.088 --> 01:13:19.309
That was my conversation with Barbara Stark, Neiman author of Isabella's Way, even in darkness and hard cider.
01:13:19.788 --> 01:13:24.198
What stayed with me after this interview is how deeply personal history really is.
01:13:24.469 --> 01:13:32.298
How stories of migration, persecution, survival, and unexpected kindness don't stay neatly in the past.
01:13:32.658 --> 01:13:38.328
They live in families, they live in memory, and sometimes they surface years later as stories.
01:13:38.328 --> 01:13:38.623
We feel.
01:13:38.988 --> 01:13:47.269
Compelled to tell Barbara's work reminds us that history isn't just dates and events, it's emotional truth.
01:13:47.988 --> 01:13:57.559
It's the choices people make under impossible circumstances, and it's the quiet ways resilience gets passed down, whether we're aware of it or not.
01:13:58.354 --> 01:14:05.524
You'll find links to Barbara's books, her website, and her availability for book clubs in the show notes.
01:14:16.409 --> 01:14:19.289
Thanks for spending time with me on Armchair Historians.
01:14:19.439 --> 01:14:26.520
If you enjoyed this episode, the easiest way to support the show is to follow or subscribe, so you never miss an episode.
01:14:27.449 --> 01:14:47.699
And if you can leave a rating or review or share the episode with a friend who loves history, you'll find my website and links to everything we discussed in the show notes, along with ways to support the show more directly, whether that's joining the community, supporting financially, or simply helping more listeners to discover the podcast.
01:14:47.970 --> 01:14:49.050
And don't forget.
01:14:49.125 --> 01:14:58.814
The show notes also include a free short story download that introduces readers to bedlam from my soon to be released historical fiction series.
01:14:59.295 --> 01:15:04.784
Until next time, keep asking questions because history is anything but finished.
