Where the Clouds Meet the Water

A most fascinating book which took place during the WWII. It follows a widower and his children being forced to Germany from South America. Their trials and hardships in war-torn Germany and finally their return back home. A true page turner I have shared with friends and family.

This is a riviting story of a family exiled from South America and sent by the Americans to Germany during World War II. It is well writen and tells a previously untold perspective of World War II. As I read the book I was continually amazed that it is a true story. This book puts you in the middle of Germany in the midst of war. It is often easy to forget the impact that war has on individuals and families. Where the Clouds meet the Water brings this to life. I give this book excellent ratings

This story is a page-turner that sweeps the reader along on a true-life adventure very skillfully reconstructed by the authors from original source documents. A well-written good read about a little-known aspect of WWII: exchange of foreign civilians used as pawns between Allies and Axis countries. The focus is on a widower's four young children taken with him from their safe home in South America and thrown into the German war zone by uncaring international politics, and separated from each other by necessity and the Nazis. Can they each survive as the war front approaches, and reunite as a family?

Where the Clouds Meet the Water follows the historical journey of the German Ecuadorian widower, Ernst Contag, and his four young children from their home in the South American Andes to Nazi Germany in 1942. Blacklisted as an enemy alien, Ernst Contag and his children are forcibly repatriated to the country of Ernst's grandparents as part of a diplomatic exchange arranged by the United States' State Department and cooperating countries. In Nazi Germany, Ernst and his children must deny their Ecuadorian past and learn to live as Germans. The Contag family strives to keep the ray of hope in their hearts when the Nazi oath of "blood and honor" leads to fear, abandonment, and death. The children and their father navigate an ever-shifting horizon as they face despair and fear in internment and refugee sites, separation, devastation and loss in Germany (1942-45), hunger and hopelessness in post-war France (1945-46), and hostility in their own Andean homeland. Through it all, the strength of family serves as the glue that holds them all together. The story is based on historical research conducted in libraries and archives on three continents, interviews with survivors of the Ecuadorian blacklist, personal records and official documents submitted to the authors by survivors and their families. Where the Clouds Meet the Water will intrigue readers of all ages who are moved by coming-of-age stories, and fascinated by World War II history and survivor stories.