Set in Nazi-occupied Poland just before the Warsaw ghetto uprising, Spinelli's first historical novel tells a tale of heartbreak, hope, and survival though the eyes of a young orphan.

"In the spring of 1942, young Elzbieta Rabinek is aware of the swiftly growing discord just beyond the courtyard of her comfortable Warsaw home. She has no fondness for the Germans who patrol her streets and impose their curfews, but has never given much thought to what goes on behind the walls that contain her Jewish neighbors. She knows all too well about German brutality--and that it's the reason she must conceal her true identity. But in befriending...

"A dazzling debut novel--the story of a turbulent, unlikely romance, a harrowing account of the lasting horrors of the Second World War, and a searing examination of one man's search for forgiveness and acceptance"--

Vowing to avenge the murder of her family, Maria, a young Polish resistance worker imprisoned in Auschwitz, plays chess in exchange for her life, and, in doing so, challenges the man who destroyed her family to one last game that will end in either failure or justice. A member of the Polish underground resistance in Nazi-occupied Warsaw, Maria Florkowska is captured by the Gestapo and imprisoned in Auschwitz. Her family is sent to their deaths; ...