I Love Hearing From Border Crossings Readers

I love hearing from the readers of BORDER CROSSINGS: Coming of Age in the Czech Resistance and this recent message printed below made my day! If you have something to say about BORDER CROSSINGS: good, bad, or indifferent please make a comment below, send an email to sn@charlesnovacekbooks.com.  or post on Facebook at  https://www.facebook.com/BorderCrossingsComingOfAgeInTheCzechResistance.

Unless I’m on a deadline, I usually respond quickly, but don’t get discouraged if I don’t get back to you right away.

Thank you to reader Lauren for reaching out and sending this letter:

Dear Sandra,

I just finished Border Crossings and I am compelled to tell you how moved I am. I heard of the book from Joseph Hurka’s*  Facebook page; I read his book while doing research on the likely history of my father.

Charles’ life has remarkable similarities to what I know about my father. His name was Jaroslav (later Jerry); he was a student in Brno and fought in the Resistance. He was captured and imprisoned, and later escaped. He went first to Paris and then Canada, later immigrating to the U.S. and becoming a citizen.

He lived for a time in Detroit  and I was born there in 1958. He even had a second marriage to a woman much younger named Sandra!

One of the sadnesses of my life is that he died in 1987, and never saw the Wall come down. He never was able to go back to his homeland.

He very seldom talked about his life in Czechoslovakia, and I was too young to care until it was too late. I am grateful to have read Charles’ story, hard as it was, and to imagine that perhaps they met at some point.

My email to Joseph Hurka was my very first fan letter; and now this is my second. I, too, am a librarian, and like a good one I borrowed Border Crossings via interlibrary loan, but I will be purchasing my own copy.

Thank you,

Lauren

*(Author of Fields of Light: A Son Remembers His Heroic Father)