Here are three things I loved

The moral conflict: Cilla and Lachlan are both essentially good characters to whom deception, disloyalty and duplicity do not come easily. Both are trapped in one way or another. Cilla has no love for the Nazis but cannot convince anyone of that. Lachlan has no desire to work with MI5, but has to face the string of moral compromises that his situation brings on. The complex layers of moral conflict within each of these characters are well drawn and compel the reader through the book for the first quarter.

The Scottish hero: Sigh. I do love a Scottish hero with red hair and a strong moral compass (I even wrote one as my hero in These Long Shadows, coming out in March!). Goodness is such an underrated quality hero, and Lachlan is a good man forced to help Cilla lie and sabotage the country he loves. Sundin hits all the right Scottish ‘beats’ from Hogmanay to Robbie Burns quotes…and when he wraps her in his plaid I almost swooned.

The black moment: The promise (and quite, frankly, joy) of a romance is a happily ever after so of course you expect that despite the obstacles to true love, everything will work out in the wash. However, I don’t think I’ve ever been as thoroughly convinced by a “black moment” in a romance story as I was by this one. I honestly didn’t think they were going to make it. To which I say, “Well played, Miss Sundin. Well played.”

Midnight on the Scottish Shore releases on 4 February 2025. Get it from Amazon US, Amazon Australia, or the usual bookish places. I was provided an advanced copy of Midnight on the Scottish Shore by Netgalley, but this didn’t influence my review.

Within These Walls of Sorrow

Within These Walls of Sorrow is about the Apteka Pod Orlem – a pharmacy operated by Poles who wouldn’t abandon their premises in the heart of the Krakow ghetto, choosing instead to risk their lives to serve those within the ghetto walls. Based on a true story, the characters are fictional amalgamations of real people. We see the world through the eyes of a pharmacist, Zosia Lewendowska, and her young Jewish neighbour, who grows into a young woman during the story. We meet the characters in 1938 and stay with them for the next seven years. Seven brutal years.

Like in her book The White Rose Resists, Amanda puts you in the shoes of a witness to history. Readers experience the same shock, disbelief and anger as Zosia, as she witnesses these events and makes heart-rending decisions about how she can best help in the face of the countless atrocities she sees. We experience the hopelessness of Jewish girl Hania Silberman, who’s youth is disrupted by the Nazi occupation and gradually disintegrates as she experiences the organised, yet still somehow arbitrary, cruelty and violence of Nazi hatred for her people.

The subject matter is sometimes difficult to get through, as it should be. These times are hard to write about, but Amanda laces courage, resistance, resilience and redemption throughout the book, proving herself a master. Her research is thorough and meticulous, so as a reader I trust her to honour the Jewish experience while telling a little-known story of Polish resistance.

The story asks tough questions. Primarily, as a person of faith, Jew or Christian, how do you understand the world when the Creator God appears to have looked away from it? How should you respond when brutality and evil infects the whole of your society?  Ultimately Zosia’s motif, a saying of her dead husband murdered by the Nazis at the beginning of the occupation, answers:

“There is evil and there is good and there is a space between. We are given free will to choose where we stand. Evil thrives when good men choose the space between.”

This unflinching book will linger with you for days afterwards. Buy from Amazon US, Amazon Australia or find other links at Amanda’s website (where you can also read an excerpt).