The Librarian of Burned Books is a captivating WWII-era novel about the intertwined fates of three women who believe in the power of books to triumph over the very darkest moments of war.
Book Description
Following the success of her debut novel, American writer Althea James receives an invitation from Joseph Goebbels himself to participate in a culture exchange program in Germany. For a girl from a small town in Maine, 1933 Berlin seems to be sparklingly cosmopolitan, blossoming in the midst of a great change with the charismatic new chancellor at the helm. Then Althea meets a beautiful woman who promises to show her the real Berlin, and soon she’s drawn into a group of resisters who make her question everything she knows about her hosts—and herself.
Paris 1936. She may have escaped Berlin for Paris, but Hannah Brecht discovers the City of Light is no refuge from the anti-Semitism and Nazi sympathizers she thought she left behind. Heartbroken and tormented by the role she played in the betrayal that destroyed her family, Hannah throws herself into her work at the German Library of Burned Books. Through the quiet power of books, she believes she can help counter the tide of fascism she sees rising across Europe and atone for her mistakes. But when a dear friend decides actions will speak louder than words, Hannah must decide what stories she is willing to live—or die—for.
New York 1944. Since her husband Edward was killed fighting the Nazis, Vivian Childs has been waging her own war: preventing a powerful senator’s attempts to censor the Armed Service Editions, portable paperbacks that are shipped by the millions to soldiers overseas. Viv knows just how much they mean to the men through the letters she receives—including the last one she got from Edward. She also knows the only way to win this battle is to counter the senator’s propaganda with a story of her own—at the heart of which lies the reclusive and mysterious woman tending the American Library of Nazi-Banned Books in Brooklyn.
As Viv unknowingly brings her censorship fight crashing into the secrets of the recent past, the fates of these three women will converge, changing all of them forever.
Inspired by the true story of the Council of Books in Wartime—the WWII organization founded by booksellers, publishers, librarians, and authors to use books as “weapons in the war of ideas”—The Librarian of Burned Books is an unforgettable historical novel, a haunting love story, and a testament to the beauty, power, and goodness of the written word.
THE LIBRARIAN OF BURNED BOOKS by Brianna Labuskes is an emotionally moving and provocative story that is about the important topics of censorship, the loss of freedoms and hate during this period from history that is as important today as it was then. Three women narrate their very different stories from pre-WWII Germany to Paris and then the United States in 1944.
Young American writer Althea James and Hannah Brecht meet in Berlin in 1933 and their story is told by Althea. Hannah Brecht is Jewish and a lesbian who has fled Germany and in 1936 is in Paris working at the German Library of Burned Books before the Germans invade. Vivian Childs is in New York in 1944 and working to fight an amendment to a bill that censors Armed Service Editions shipped to the millions of service men overseas. As Vivian works to set up a rally to fight censorship and gain attention to her battle, she unknowingly is about to shine a light on other’s secrets and change all their lives forever.
I am surprised this is the debut novel from this author. Even carrying three different storylines at different times and locations, the narratives never seemed to lose focus. The historical research is evident, and I was checking out actual pictures on-line of the Book Burning Memorial in Germany when I finished. And when I finished, I was so moved I had tears in my eyes and had to grab a tissue. Each of the women in this story are believable characters with very different journeys and yet their love of books brought them all together. There is a budding lesbian romance in this book and descriptions of the liberal cabarets in pre-WWII Germany which some may find offensive as well as some graphic violence.
This is a intriguing historical fiction tale that I could not put down. If you love books and abhor past and present censorship, I believe you will love this book as much as I did. I will be looking for future books by this author.
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Author Bio
Born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Brianna Labuskes graduated from Penn State University with a degree in journalism. For the past eight years, she has worked as an editor at both small-town papers and national media organizations such as Politico and Kaiser Health News, covering politics and policy. Her historical romance novel, One Step Behind, was released by Entangled Publishing. She lives in Washington, DC, and enjoys traveling, hiking, kayaking, and exploring the city’s best brunch options. Visit her at www.briannalabuskes.com.
Today I am sharing my Feature Post and Book Review for SIGNS OF LIFE by Chris Towndrow on this Overview Media Blog Tour.
Below you will find a book blurb, my book review, the author’s bio and social media links. Enjoy!
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Book Blurb
What time can’t heal, love will.
Arizona, 1878. When long-time widower Earl finds an injured deaf youth on the prairie, he reluctantly decides to help the boy as compensation for not being there to save his own wife and baby from a Mojave raiding party years earlier.
He lodges the youngster – “Bill” – with a local widow, Laura, whose daughter is deaf. Soon, sign language and shared loss deepen their friendship and begin his healing. Together, they stand firm against the town’s prejudices, led by the boorish Mayor Potter.
But just when Earl believes his life has turned a corner, and he is ready to embrace love for this new woman, he learns the truth about his lost family. As his dark past threatens to return, Earl must face his own guilt and prejudice or risk losing everything all over again.
Can Earl overcome his past failings and face down danger? Will Laura’s kindness and faith be repaid? Can the boy’s mistakes be fixed? Will love prevail?
SIGNS OF LIFE by Chris Towndrow is an engaging western historical fiction with romantic elements, friendship, family, and prejudice set in Arizona in 1878.
This story tells the tale of widower, Earl who lost his wife and infant son in an Indian raid and becomes an embittered man. When Earl and his friend find a boy in the desert, Earl is reluctant to help him especially when they discover the boy is deaf, but they do take him into the nearby town and to a widow, Laura, who has a deaf daughter.
As Earl fights not only his own prejudice, but the prejudice he discovers in town, he discovers a shocking fact about not only the boy they saved, but about the family he lost.
This is a very character driven story that is an entertaining read, but not quite what I was expecting. I was expecting more of a Zane Grey stylized story, but this book is written in short chapters like a modern-day thriller. The scenes of town life felt realistic, and the dialogue also felt appropriate to the period. Earl’s character growth and evolving emotions felt believable and his road to forgiveness is a major theme. All the other characters are well drawn and add depth to the story. I am an avid romance reader and there are romantic elements woven into this story, but I would not consider this a romance. It is a western fiction first with the romance leading to healing in Earl’s story arc.
Overall, an appealing character driven western historical fiction.
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Chris Towndrow – Author
Author Bio
Chris Towndrow has been a writer since 1991.
He began writing science fiction, inspired by Asimov, Iain M Banks, and numerous film and TV canons. After a few years creating screenplays across several genres, in 2004 he branched out into playwriting and has had several productions professionally performed. This background is instrumental in his ability to produce realistic, compelling dialogue in his books.
His first published novel was 2012’s space opera “Sacred Ground”. He then changed focus into “hard” sci-fi books, and the Enna Dacourt pentalogy was completed in 2023.
He has always drawn inspiration from the big screen, and 2019’s quirky romantic black comedy “Tow Away Zone” owes much to the film canon of the Coen Brothers. This has been his most well-received book to date, and spawned two sequels in what became the “Sunrise trilogy”.
His first historical fiction novel, “Signs Of Life”, was published by Valericain Press in 2023.
In 2023, Chris returns to his passion for writing accessible humour and will devote his efforts to romantic comedies. The first of these scripts is currently in development.
Chris lives on the outskirts of London with his family and works as a video editor and producer. He is a member of the UK Society of Authors.
Spring, 1938: Café Mozart in the heart of Vienna is beloved by its clientele, including cousins Mathias Kraemer and Johannes Namal. The two writers are as close as brothers. They are also members of Freud’s Circle—a unique group of the famed psychiatrist’s friends and acquaintances who once gathered regularly at the bright and airy café to talk about books and ideas over coffee and pastries. But dark days are looming.
With Hitler’s annexation of Austria, Nazi edicts governing daily life become stricter and more punitive. Now Hitler has demanded that the “hidden Jews” of Vienna be tracked down, and Freud’s Circle has been targeted. The SS aims to use old group photos to identify Jewish intellectuals and subversives. With the vise tightening around them, Mathias and Johannes’s only option appears to be hiding in plain sight, using assumed names and identities to evade detection, aware that discovery would mean consignment to a camp or execution.
Faced with stark and desperate choices, Mathias, Johannes, their families and friends all find their loyalties and courage tested in unimaginable ways. But despite betrayal, heartache and imprisonment, hope remains, and with it, the determination to keep those they love alive, and Mathias and Johannes at the same time discovering that what originally condemned them—their writing—might also be their salvation.
THE VIENNA WRITERS CIRCLE by J.C. Maetis is an incredibly intense historical fiction that kept me unnerved and on the edge of my seat through most of the book. This book is not for the faint of heart and describes scenes of man’s inhumanity to man is a stark way through the lens of two Jewish thriller writers in Vienna during WWII.
Cousins Mathias Kraemer and Johannes Namal are thriller writers and members of famed psychiatrist Sigmund Freud’s Circle; intellectuals who meet at the Mozart Café to discuss books and current ideas on a variety of topics. When the Germans annex Austria, Freud is able to leave for England, but others must find their own ways to leave the country, hide under fake identities or be rounded up and deported to a concentration camp or be executed.
Mathias and Johannes are faced with anguishing choices to protect their families and friends. With the continual pursuit of an ambitious and sadistic SS officer and the constant fear of their true identities being revealed, their writing may be what ultimately saves them.
This book is a stark look at the daily terrorism faced by these two main characters and what they did to survive. I found the story more intriguing and disturbing because it is told only through the victims’ eyes. There are not a lot of breaks from the intensity of the plot pace and I found I had to put this book down a few times, not because it is not good, but to calm down emotionally. The research is evident and the characters memorable.
I highly recommend this WWII historical fiction!
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About the Author
J.C. Maetis is better known as British thriller writer John Matthews whose books have sold over 1.6 million copies and been translated in 14 languages. Maetis is his father’s original Jewish family name, which he felt was more fitting for this novel. His father’s family left Lithuania for London in 1919 in the wake of Jewish pogroms there, but many of his extended family perished when Hitler invaded Lithuania in 1941. Maetis lives in Surrey, UK.
Today is my turn to share my Feature Post and Book Review for A NOBLE CUNNING: The Countess and the Tower by Patricia Bernstein on this Virtual Book Tour.
Below you will find a book summary, my book review, an excerpt from the book, an about the author section and the author’s social media links. This is an exciting debut historical fiction novel based on a true story. Enjoy!
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Book Summary
A thrilling tale, based on a true story, of one woman’s tremendous courage and incomparable wit in trying to rescue her husband from the Tower of London the night before he is to be executed.
The heroine of A Noble Cunning, Bethan Glentaggart, Countess of Clarencefield, a persecuted Catholic noblewoman, is determined to try every possible means of saving her husband’s life, with the help of a group of devoted women friends.
Amid the turbulence of the 1715 Rebellion against England’s first German king George I, Bethan faces down a mob attack on her home, travels alone from the Scottish Lowlands to London through one of the worst snowstorms in many years, and confronts a cruel king before his court to plead for mercy for her husband Gavin. As a last resort, Bethan and her friends must devise and put in motion a devilishly complex scheme featuring multiple disguises and even the judicious use of poison to try to free Gavin.
Though rich with historical gossip and pageantry, Bethan’s story also demonstrates the damage that politics and religious fanaticism can inflict on the lives of individuals.
A NOBLE CUNNING: The Countess and the Tower by Patricia Bernstein is an engaging debut historical fiction novel based on a true story featuring a fictional noble Scottish Catholic couple at the time of the Jacobite Uprising and the rise of the Protestant House of Hanover. This is a debut standalone historical fiction novel that is immersive, easy to read and difficult to put down.
Bethan Glentaggert, Countess of Clarencefield lives with her husband and children in the Scottish Lowlands. While prospering, they must always be vigilant as they are Catholics in a land that has made practicing their faith illegal. When Queen Anne dies and the throne is now by law only to be given to a Protestant, the next in line is the German born George of Hanover. This sparks the Jacobite Uprising and the march of Catholics and those who do not recognize the German as king against the throne including Bethan’s husband, Gavin.
Bethan’s husband ends up in the Tower of London waiting execution for treason. Bethan does everything she can to have him pardoned, but her pleas fall on deaf ears. She refuses to give up and she comes up with a cunning plan to save her husband from the executioner’s ax.
I loved Bethan, her strength, intelligence, and cunning plan. That she is based on a real historical character that I previously knew nothing about makes her story that much more enjoyable because I like finding new stories in history when they involve strong female characters. The plan to save her husband was ingenious for the period and gives the story plot the tension of a suspense novel. This story is written with historical detail, both descriptive and in dialogue, to the religious conflict present in England for many decades and I feel the author remains neutral in the telling of the story. I was pleased the author wrote the story in a linear timeline and used quotes and books from authors of the time to give a sense of time and place. This is a well-researched historical fiction novel with a strong female protagonist that I thoroughly enjoyed reading.
I highly recommend this debut historical fiction novel.
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Excerpt
Chapter One
No Safe Place
Heath Hall, Scottish Lowlands, 1710
“…we shall do our utmost endeavor to have the land purged of Popish idolatry … particularly the abomination of the mass We shall never, consent, for any reason whatsoever, that the Penal Statutes, made against Papists should be annulled; but shall, when opportunity offers, be ready to concur in putting them to a due and vigorous execution.” – The Auchensaugh Renovation of the National Covenant.
Reformed Presbytery, July 24, 1712.
I had gone to bed early and slept soundly until I was awakened by a wild noise of cries and shouts almost under my windows. I rose and peered out. As if one of my most troubled dreams had come to life, at least one hundred men were gathered below, waving smoky torches and brandishing pikes and hammers and other tools they had probably seized from our smithy.
One night in London many years earlier, when I was a child of nine, I had witnessed a raucous anti-Catholic parade made up of London rowdies disguised as grotesque parodies of priests and bishops and the pope. Ever since then, I have feared mobs at night, faces distorted by flickering torchlight.
I looked down from my window upon this motley crowd of bedraggled sowers and reapers, my senses assaulted by the sting of smoke and the writhing fingers of flame. For a moment I swayed and felt that I might fall. Gavin, my husband, was many leagues away politicking in the back-street coffeehouses of Edinburgh. How could I face this crowd without him?
But I could not fall. I am Bethan Carlisle Glentaggart, Countess of Clarencefield, a Catholic amid the heathen Protestants, I thought, and must show neither fear nor weakness. Unruly crowds of this kind feed on the terror they engender in their betters. I repressed an involuntary shiver and vowed to demonstrate that they were dealing with a woman of spirit, in full command of her household, not a mere drawing-room ornament. They would not smell my fear. My heart banged violently in my chest, but I would smooth my features as I had seen my mother do when our family was threatened.
The boldest of the leaders–a ragged bunch with tousled hair, mismatched garments and broken-down shoes–hallooed up at me.
“Mistress, you are hiding a Romanish priest, a servant of Satan, and we will have him! Bring him out or we will come in, as is our right by law!”
Oh yes, of course, I thought but did not say, your “legal rights” are meant to be exercised in the dark of night with a mob at your back, against unprotected women and children.
My brain, still a little sodden with sleep, churned and brought forth no response for a moment, but then clarity broke through.
“Hold there, sirrah. I will come down to you,” I cried.
I tossed an unlaced gown over my shift and wrapped a cloak over the whole. Leaving my hair loose, I ran down the stairs, as the storm of bangings and knockings on the front door grew louder and more insistent. Despite the noise, I paused for an instant at the foot of the stairs to run my hands over my face, trying to forcibly soften lines of worry and subdue the pinch of anxiety around my eyes and mouth.
My companion Lucy had also risen. Shocked and pale-faced, she came running to me barefooted. For once, she, also abruptly jerked from sleep, had no advice to give. But I was beginning to feel more confident that I could maintain at least the outward appearance of a woman who was unruffled by scares in the night, even though my legs were trembling.
“I have read this chapter before,” I told Lucy. “When I was only seven, soldiers came to our home in Wales for this self-same purpose, hunting an illegal priest. I believe I can manage these vermin as my mother once did. None of these men are fit to kiss the hem of Father Jerome’s shabbiest robe.”
Then Lucy and I looked at each other. She gasped. The fact was we had been hosting Father Jerome, a secret missionary priest from France, traveling disguised as an itinerant shepherd and sleeping in the shielings or shepherd’s huts used during summer grazing.
Somehow the priests who came to Scotland knew where the Catholics were and who would welcome them. Father Jerome, diminutive and elderly–but sinewy and strong enough to climb goat paths from glen to glen–once acknowledged to me that he knew his ultimate fate would be exile, prison or perhaps death at the hands of a mob.
“We all believe that at some point we will be caught, my lady, and we are resigned,” he had said with his gentle smile. “When that time comes, I will be grateful for my years spent comforting a scattered and persecuted flock.” I had knelt and asked for his blessing. The itinerant priests were the holiest men I ever knew.
Father Jerome was supposed to have left us at dusk, but neither Lucy nor I had actually seen him go. He had a way of slipping away into the dark without making a sound. But what if he had not yet left and was still somewhere in the house? I had to hope he would take heed of the commotion and make himself scarce.
I could hear the leader of the mob yelling, “We will not give you time to hide him. Open this door or we will break it to…” I managed to raise the iron latch and pulled open the heavy oak door, just in time for him to screech the end of his sentence in my face, “…splinters.”
The night was cold. It was close to Christmastide and, though there was no snow, the wind was sharp. I gathered my cloak more closely around me.
This spokesman was of medium height and spindly, his coat torn and half off his shoulder. His long, greasy, gray-brown hair crept back from his forehead as if it were running away from his face, embarrassed by his actions. His linen was soiled, and his jacket sleeves were too short for his knobby-boned wrists. Ah, but he carried a Bible and proceeded to wave it in my face.
“And you are…,” I asked quietly.
He hesitated, thinking perhaps to hide his identity, which was absurd. A shorter, even grimier man standing next to him–this one wearing a shapeless hat jammed almost down to his eyebrows–punched the leader’s arm.
“Minister Adam Goodnow,” the leader declared, and immediately tried to seize the offensive again by brandishing the Bible in my direction. “Bring us the priest and we will trouble you no further tonight: ‘For your priests have violated My law and have profaned My holy things; they have put no difference between the unclean and the clean and I am profaned among them.’”
“Ezekiel 22:26,” he concluded with an air of satisfaction.
“There is no priest here,” I said, forcing a calm tone into my voice that I did not feel. “We would bring no man into danger.”
“Your souls are in danger,” he spit at me, “if you follow the Whore of Babylon and pursue the Antichrist into darkness…”
I pushed my palm out towards him, intent on holding it steady. I had to find a way to keep a horde of wild men from rampaging through my home. I remembered that, when the soldiers came to Castle Banwy in Wales, when I was seven, my mother took control by telling them they could search for a priest if they left their muddy boots outside. Something about the foolishness of marching upstairs and down in their dirty stockings full of holes took the edge off their eagerness to find the priest. Perhaps I could keep most of these men outside if I gave way just a little.
“It is late,” I said. “My babies are asleep. I desire you not to wake them. Three of you–no more than three–may come in and search the house…if you do it quietly and do not wake the children.”
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About the Author
Patricia Bernstein was born in El Paso and grew up in Dallas. She earned a Degree of Distinction in American Studies from Smith College and taught English at Smith for four years before returning to Texas. In Houston she founded a public relations agency and published dozens of articles in media venues as varied as Texas Monthly, Cosmopolitan and The Smithsonian.
Her first book was Having a Baby: Mothers Tell Their Stories, a collection of first-person childbirth accounts from the 1890s to the 1990s. The second was The First Waco Horror: The Lynching of Jesse Washington and the Rise of the NAACP about a horrifying “spectacle lynching” which took place in Waco in 1916, and the young women’s suffrage activist hired by the fledgling NAACP to investigate the lynching. The third was Ten Dollars to Hate: The Texas Man Who Fought the Klan about the millions-strong 1920s Ku Klux Klan in Texas and across the US. The book was a finalist for the Ramirez Family Award from the Texas Institute of Letters and was named one of the 53 best books ever written about Texas by the Austin American Statesman.
Patricia lives in Houston with her husband Alan Bernstein where she sings with Opera in the Heights and other organizations, and admires the achievements of her three wonderful and very different daughters. A Noble Cunning is her debut novel, inspired by a story she heard during a visit to Scotland in 2014.
Longtime personal assistant Georgie Mulcahy has made a career out of putting others before herself. When an unexpected upheaval sends her away from her hectic job in L.A. and back to her hometown, Georgie must confront an uncomfortable truth: her own wants and needs have always been a disconcertingly blank page.
But then Georgie comes across a forgotten artifact—a “friendfic” diary she wrote as a teenager, filled with possibilities she once imagined. To an overwhelmed Georgie, the diary’s simple, small-scale ideas are a lifeline—a guidebook for getting started on a new path.
Georgie’s plans hit a snag when she comes face to face with an unexpected roommate—Levi Fanning, onetime town troublemaker and current town hermit. But this quiet, grouchy man is more than just his reputation, and he offers to help Georgie with her quest. As the two make their way through her wishlist, Georgie begins to realize that what she truly wants might not be in the pages of her diary after all, but right by her side—if only they can both find a way to let go of the pasts that hold them back.
Honest and deeply emotional, Georgie, All Along is a smart, tender must-read for everyone who’s ever wondered about the life that got away . . .
GEORGIE, ALL ALONG by Kate Clayborn is a beautiful journey of self-discovery and finding where you belong along with quirky hippy parents, a best friend who seems to always have it all together, and a one-time town troublemaker and his dog. This is a standalone women’s fiction/romance and the first, but will not be the last, book I have read by this author.
Georgie Mulcahy has made a living from putting other people first. When Georgie’s current Tinsel Town client decides to retire, she does not know what she wants to do, but her best friend is pregnant and asking for her help, so she returns to her hometown. She returns to her parents’ home to find they have also allowed Levi to stay while his house is being remodeled. Levi is basically a hermit after being a troublemaker in his youth and opposite the open Georgie.
Georgie finds an old “friend-fic” while helping her friend and decides this just might be the guidebook she needs to start a new path. As Georgie and Levi spend more time together, Levi wants to help Georgie with her old to-do list, and they discover they both have pasts they need to accept before they can move forward.
This is a deeply emotional attempt to go back to find your future. Georgie is a giver and fixer who feels empty personally and as you read along you find you are yelling at the book, trying to tell Georgie she is perfect just the way she is. Levi is a wonderful grump who proves to be so much more and is a wonderful counterpoint to Georgie’s openness and caring. The parents of both Georgie and Levi could not have been more different and I know which I prefer. Levi and Georgie are wonderful together and I was happy with the family reconciliations in this story and glad that others were not forced to make a resolution. The story would have felt false to me otherwise. Being a pitbull owner myself, all Hank’s traits made me smile and I know the difficulties are real that Levi faced at times with others.
I highly recommend this wonderfully uplifting women’s fiction/romance and I am looking forward to checking out other books by this author.
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About the Author
Kate Clayborn is the critically acclaimed author of six novels. Her work has been featured in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Oprah Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, Bookpage, and more. By day she works in education, and by night (and sometimes, by very early morning) she writes contemporary romances about smart, strong, modern heroines who face the world alongside true friends and complicated families. She resides in Virginia with her husband and their dig.
Luck is the story of Daniel – a man born with the gift of being able to influence others. He learns that he can both charm as well as destroy. As his ability grows, so does his craving for acceptance.
Once his ability is unleashed on the American political stage, Daniel finds that he no longer has to settle with charming the few. Now he can control the minds of the masses, as his own sanity descends into a tormented oblivion.
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Book Review
RATING: 4 out of 5 Stars
LUCK by Chris Coppel is an engrossing political thriller/horror/sci-fi mash-up that continually left me guessing what twist was coming next. I have always believed the truth of the quote “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts completely.” and with Daniel’s gift, I could not wait to see where this story led.
Daniel was born with a gift. From his birth, he is able to see auras around people and influence them accordingly. He learns as he grows how to charm them, use them, or destroy them. He successfully ascends to the heights of a business career and now he has his sights set on a political career. Daniel can not only control the masses in live audiences, but also through the television cameras. The more he uses his special power to advance the more reckless and dangerous he becomes.
Daniel plans on taking the highest office in the land, but someone from his past is making their own plans to stop him.
This story has a bit of everything. I was sitting on the edge of my seat waiting to see what Daniel would do next or who he would hurt and the author would throw in a bit of humor or political satire. This is a fast-paced story that is at times horrifying, shocking, and captivating. I think almost everyone wants people to like them and agree with them, but this story takes that desire to the extreme in a twisted and interesting way.
This is the second book I have read by this author and I can truly state that he always leaves me thinking about the characters and story I have just read, and he also always leaves me with a surprise twist at the end.
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About the Author
Chris believes that stories should be able to transport the reader to different places, where they can experience events and dimensions that have never been considered. Chris is able to write gentle fable-like adventures (Far From Burden Dell) as well as opening the pages into dark and terrifying stories where dimensions co-exist with indescribable evil. (Legacy).
Chris Coppel was born in California and has since split his time between the USA and Europe, living in California, Spain, France, Switzerland and England.
Chris has held senior operations positions for both Warner Bros. and Universal Studios. Chris also held the position of Director of Operations for UCLA’s Film School where he also taught advanced screen writing. Chris and his wife Clare spent many years helping animal rescue with Best Friends Animal Society in Utah. Before joining Best Friends, Chris was President and Managing Director of the Home Entertainment Division of Testronics in Los Angeles.
Following in his father’s footsteps (Alec Coppel wrote Vertigo among many other successful movies) Chris has written numerous screenplays as well as the novels Far From Burden Dell, Luck, The Lodge, Legacy and Lakebed.
Chris is also an accomplished drummer and guitarist. He and his wife currently live in the UK.
