The Man who Had to Leave
Publisher: Atlas Contact
How my grandfather’s life ended under the guillotine in 1943
Personal drama of a man who ends up in the wrong place in history
A true-life pageturner about a judicial killing
A history as unimaginable as it is blood-curdling
For readers of Annejet van der Zijl
Jacob Dirkmaat, a simple merchant from the Dutch province of North-Holland, did not have luck on his side. After the tough crisis years in the 1930’s, trade and love drove him to Vienna. Golden times are finally dawning. But rising Nazism turns the city into a grim arena. Only when it is too late does Jacob discover that he is the plaything of the new authorities. In 1943, following a verdict by a Nazi court, he is beheaded – a dark history that is kept quiet in the family. When letters turn up from Jacob’s mysterious lover in 2018, his granddaughter Frances Sanders sets out to investigate. In blistering fashion, she unravels how the net of malice and betrayal closes around her grandfather. The Man Who Had to Leave is the personal tragedy of a man who dreamed big and fell deep: the story of a man swallowed up by the maelstrom of his times.
