Happy release day to Ann Marie Stewart! Her highly personal historical novel, The Remnants is now available.
The Remnants has been 45 years in the making, and with the current issue of Crimea/Ukraine/Refugees/Immigration, it couldn’t be more timely. Ann Marie Stewart’s grandparents left behind a child in the wake of their escape from Soviet Russian, that hard fact begs the question, At what cost is our freedom?
Out of 17,000 Germans trapped in Moscow in late 1929, 5,769 got out. Only four were admitted to the United States. That was her family.
“If we don’t leave now, we may never get out.”
Lena and Nikolai Siemens dream of a simple life on the steppes of 1920s Crimea—farming their land, raising their children, and practicing their Mennonite faith in peace.
But as Stalin’s iron fist closes around Russia’s German Mennonite communities, Lena and Nikolai flee toward Moscow in a desperate bid for freedom. Surrounded by thousands of fellow refugees, they wait in disease-ridden camps, watching children die while bureaucrats deny their exit visas again and again.
After months of uncertainty, Nikolai is arrested. Lena takes refuge in a maternity home. And three-year-old Kolja is deported back to Crimea, fifteen hundred miles away.
Then the miracle happens: Exit visas. But only for forty-eight hours. No time to reach Kolja before the door closes forever.
Now Lena and Nikolai face an unbearable choice: Escape with their newborn and trust their family will be reunited . . . or stay in Russia and risk the wrath of Stalin.
Award-winning author Ann Marie Stewart crafts a meticulously researched historical family saga based on the true story of her grandparents’ resilience in the face of overwhelming odds. A powerful testament to the unbreakable bonds of family, The Remnants will captivate historical fiction fans and readers of The Nightingale and Before We Were Yours.
About Ann Marie Stewart:
I’m a sheep farmer, musical theater director, and voice teacher. And I also love telling, hearing, and writing stories with meaning. Stories that inspire me to consider characters and their dilemmas. Because, every good story begins with an underlying question that the reader needs answered by the end of the novel.
“What happens when the worst possible event happens to your family and it might be your fault?” (STARS IN THE GRASS).
“Is it always better to know the truth?” (OUT OF THE WATER).
“What price are you willing to pay for your family’s freedom?” (THE REMNANTS).
RE words capture my favorite themes in literature: reconciliation, renewal, redemption. I spend time writing or reading books that are READeemables–Quality reads that are worth the time to write and to read, and oh so satisfying.
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