Featured New Release: A Night of Long Knives

Okay, ready for the story behind this one?

Thanks to Win a Book, I met Rebecca Chastain, who runs Number One Novels. Every week or so, Rebecca interviews a debut author and gives a few copies of the debut novel away. It’s a great site; Rebecca has fantastic taste in books. Yes, this is a hint!

One week, I actually entered — and won. The book was Rebecca Cantrell’s A Trace of Smoke, which I thought my book club might like (I’m going to pass it around among us, in fact. Once my desk spits it back out). I read it. I Tweeted about it …and attracted Rebecca Cantrell, the author of A Trace of Smoke (I know! Lots of Rebeccas around here. No wonder I just named a character that!). We got to chatting, as authors do.

Yesterday, A Night of Long Knives, the sequel to A Trace of Smoke, was released. So I HAD to ask Rebecca my favorite question: what song makes you think of your book?

Here’s what she had to say:

Song of a German Mother, lyrics by Bertolt Brecht, music by Kurt Weill, sung by Lotte Lenya. I only have the English version (from the Lenya Sings Weill album).

It’s a political song that sums up the horror that would engulf Germany. At first the mother is proud that her son is doing something, part of something, but then she realizes that the brown shirt she bought him (storm trooper uniform) will be his winding sheet, because he has been killed. I feel sad every time I listen to it.

I can’t find this particular version of the song on YouTube. Here’s some Lotte Lenya, singing a Kurt Weill song. What a very period voice she has!

I couldn’t find the song itself, either — at least, not a terribly audible one. Holler if you’re more successful than I am… and in the meantime, pick up the book!

Here’s the cover blurb:

Journalist Hannah Vogel has vowed to never again set foot in her homeland of Germany while the Nazis are still in power. She has good reason: three years ago in 1931, she kidnapped her son, Anton, from the man claiming to be his father–Ernst Rohm, head of the Nazis’ SA. A powerful man not to be trifled with, Hannah knows that Rohm will never stop searching for them.

Hannah is asked to write about a zeppelin journey from South America to Switzerland, but Switzerland turns out to be too close. The zeppelin is diverted to Munich, where Hannah and Anton are kidnapped and, to Hannah’s horror, separated.

It’s unlucky timing for Rohm, however. Hitler has ordered the execution of Rohm and hundreds of his storm troopers and is determined to wipe out any remaining traces of his name. The Night of the Long Knives has begun.

When Rohm is killed before Hannah can ascertain Anton’s whereabouts, she desperately enlists all of her remaining sources and friends to locate Anton before the Nazis do. And the Gestapo is closing in…

Thrilling and powerful, A Night of Long Knives breathtakingly recreates a shattered and betrayed city as it plunges into darkness.

And, if you missed it above, the buy link for A Night of Long Knives. And for good measure, since you’ll want to start at the beginning and pick up both of these books, here’s the link for A Trace of Smoke.

Don’t miss these. There are more under contract, too!

(As always, I’m an affiliate at Powell’s, so if you click through and buy stuff, I’ll get a few pennies. If those pennies ever add up, I’ll turn them into goodies for you guys. No direct profit for me on this deal!)