Product Description

Allenstein, East Prussia, 1939 - Charlotte von Datski's parents hold a glittering ball to celebrate her eighteenth birthday and to announce her engagement to a Prussian Count. But Hitler is about to plunge the world into war - Charlotte is forced to leave flee to England. Years on, Charlotte's granddaughter, Laura, persuades her grandmother to embark on a journey into her past. As Charlotte recalls the one great love of her life, she finally faces the demons that have haunted her for over half a century.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #191011 in Books
• Published on: 2008-08-21
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 336 pages

About the Author
Catrin Collier was born into a close Welsh family in 1948 - very aware of her dual heritage. The war was recent, her mother German, her father Welsh. After working in various jobs, she became a full-time writer in 1994. In 1995 she accompanied her mother when she returned to East Prussia (now Poland) for the first time in fifty years. There she read the diaries that her mother and grandmother had kept and talked about life under the Nazis. ONE LAST SUMMER is the result of those conversations. She lives with her husband in Wales.

Customer Reviews

An engaging and moving story
I have just finished a non-fiction book about the German people's experiences after 1945. A friend recommended me this as it takes its starting point as a young German woman growing up in East Prussia during the war, and her experiences as the Red Army steamroll across westwards in 1945. It is a love story between Charlotte and a Red Army POW who is working on her father's estate. The narrative is told through her diary and a backstory. The front story is Charlotte in the twilight years of her life, returning to the ancestral home, with her granddaughter.

It is a beautiful book and very movingly told. The introduction reveals that the book is based on the author's own family experiences, and this shines through as she deals with what is a very difficult subject with great sensitivity and aplomb.

Top marks!

Epic stuff - think Doctor Zhivago
This is the best book I've read in a long while. Faster paced and having greater depth than an ordinary saga, it's up with the big ones. I'm sure that in time others will share my views. If a lesser book like Charlotte Grey can make it to the big screen, why can't something as wonderful as this?

Doctor Zhivago has met it's match!!
This is the first Catrin Collier book I have read but I'm now very keen to read more. This book starts just before WW2 breaks out in Prussia, now Poland. The characters are full bloodied, lively and engaging and I was hooked by the fast-paced story. It is also a beautiful love story - I think Dr Zhivago has met it's match!