Postwar Survivor

The war is over. For fifteen-year-old Karl Veth, the fight to build a life has only begun.

Germany, October 1945. Five months after the end of World War II, Karl has survived the fall of Berlin and finally reunited with his family. But there is little comfort waiting for them.

Their Berlin home is gone. His father cannot find work. The family has been designated refugees and now lives in the cramped annex of a demolished farm. Food is desperately scarce, ration coupons are nearly worthless, and survival often depends on what can be traded or obtained on the black market.

At just fifteen, Karl has become the family's temporary breadwinner.

But his father believes survival is not enough.

Before the war, German boys traditionally left home at fourteen to begin apprenticeships under skilled masters. The war disrupted that path for Karl, but his father is determined that his son will learn an honorable trade and gain the skills he will need to make his own way in the world.

So Karl must leave home once again.

What follows is a journey through a country struggling to rebuild itself, where old traditions collide with a radically changed Germany and the resourcefulness that carried Karl through the war becomes just as important in the uncertain peace that follows. His apprenticeship will demand hard work, independence, and adaptation, while setting him on a path toward a future he cannot yet fully imagine.

His destination is America. But first, Karl must learn how to build a life from the ruins of the one he knew.

Postwar Survivor is the first book in Horst Christian's two-book Journey to America series. A work of fiction based on a true story, it continues Karl's remarkable journey through the aftermath of World War II and the experiences that will eventually lead him across the ocean to a new homeland.