Few people are aware that in the aftermath of German and Soviet invasions and division of Poland, more than 1.5 million people were deported from their homes in Eastern Poland to remote parts of Russia. Half of them died in labor camps and prisons or simply vanished, some were drafted into the Russian army, and a small number returned to Poland after the war. Those who made it out of Russia alive were lucky-and nine-year-old Krystyna Mihulka was among...

Nineteen-year-old Emma Bau has been married only three weeks when Nazi tanks thunder into her native Poland. Within days Emma's husband, Jacob, is forced to disappear underground, leaving her imprisoned within the citys decrepit Jewish ghetto. But then, in the dead of night, the resistance smuggles her out. Taken to Krakow to live with Jacob's Catholic aunt, Krysia, Emma takes on a new identity as Anna Lipowski, a gentile. Emma's already precarious...

Having left Poland and braved ocean storms to join her father in America, Krysia arrives at Ellis Island on Christmas Eve.

Bob and Brigit, a Canadian couple, have managed to screw up their previously successful lives when a wild investment in GoldRush, a mining company, lands the family in deep debt. Brigit is a heroine through it all, we might say a heroine-martyr. The debt paid off, and Brigit persuades Bob they need to hike the Camino de Santiago pilgrim trail. Bob is all up for some European sophistication and good times. Grand idea, but if crossing mountain passes,...