THE SUNFLOWER HOUSE

A woman uncovers her mother’s past in an understudied chapter of World War II history.

After her 86-year-old mother falls off a step stool in her closet, Katrine finds a hidden box with a swastika on the lid—a symbol of hate that turns out to contain the remnants of her mother’s love story. In a single day, her mother, Allina, shares the story of her childhood in Germany and journey to America, a story she’d never told Katrine before, changing the course of their relationship. Allina grew up in Badensburg, raised by her aunt and uncle and betrothed to her childhood sweetheart. Badensburg is an idyllic 150-person village, defined by lake views and strudel until the fall of 1938. That’s when Allina wakes to gunfire one day and flees Badensburg, carrying little but the forged papers that conceal her half-Jewish identity. The next day, she finds herself at a building that’s part of Heinrich Himmler’s eugenics program, Lebensborn—a “baby factory” devoted to providing children to “pure” German families. The inhabitants are told that “every mother of good blood is a sacred asset of our existence,” especially considering how many lives were lost during the war. Allina has never been good at concealing her thoughts, no matter how heretical, so SS officer Karl von Strassberg needs only a glimpse of her face to know she isn’t like the other German women in the program. Karl recruits Allina for a secret project to rescue the Lebensborn children, at great personal risk. As Germany’s power grows, Allina and Karl reveal themselves to one another, their alliance gaining momentum alongside its inevitable historical context. Allegri raises questions about duty, morality, circumstance, and sacrifice. Embodying those dilemmas are Allina, the resilient woman who refuses to become a victim, and Karl, the villain with a heart of gold. Although these old tropes do ring familiar, Allegri imbues her characters with a depth of feeling that’s alive and entirely its own.

A bright emergency flare of a story sent up from history’s darkness.