The Baker's Daughter: A Novel - Softcover

"Replete with raw emotion and suspense, The Baker's Daughter is a fascinating journey through a horrifying time in world history that will resonate long after you close the book." --Historical Novel Society

"A beautiful, heart-breaking gem of a novel written just the way I like them, with the past coming back to haunt the present, endearing heroines and a sunny, hopeful ending. You'll wolf it up in one delicious gulp." --Tatiana de Rosnay, international bestselling author of Sarah's Key and A Secret Kept

"The Baker's Daughter was a constant warm companion to me during cross-country travels, a novel I looked forward to returning to night after night. The rare book in which the modern-day story is as compelling as the wartime tale it contains, The Baker's Daughter offers a look at Nazi Germany through the lens of the immigration issues of our own time. El Paso, TX and Garmisch, Germany make for an unexpected harmony of flavors." --Jenna Blum, international bestselling author of The Stormchasers and Those Who Save Us

"A sensitive, multilayered novel, this is a moving examination of the effect war and the politics of exclusion, have on the human heart." --Amanda Hodgkinson, New York Times bestselling author of 22 Brittania Road

"A haunting and beautiful story... Spanning sixty years, and taking on forms of human cruelty and indifference ranging from the Nazis to modern-day immigration reform, McCoy forces us to examine the choices we make. I was riveted from start to finish." --J. Courtney Sullivan, New York Times bestselling author of Commencement and Maine

"This is a beautifully told, richly detailed story that grabs your heart from page one and keeps its hold long after the last page. It is a book to discuss, to share and ultimately to savor." --Sarah Jio, author of The Violets of March

"Elsie Schmidt is the brave and unforgettable heroine of Sarah McCoy's beautifully written tale of family, friendship, and love. The Baker's Daughter demonstrates how the past can teach us--if only we will listen." --Kelly O'Connor McNees, author of The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott

"Sarah McCoy's The Baker's Daughter explores what happens when our loyalties (to country, cause, family, religion) clash with our intuition. A complex braiding of mystery, history, and personality, this novel is engaging and wonderful." --Sheri Reynolds, New York Times bestselling author of The Rapture of Canaan

In this New York Times bestseller, two women in different eras face similar life-altering decisions, the politics of exclusion, the terrible choices we face in wartime, and the redemptive power of love.

In 1945, Elsie Schmidt is a naive teenager, as eager for her first sip of champagne as she is for her first kiss. She and her family have been protected from the worst of the terror and desperation overtaking her country by a high-ranking Nazi who wishes to marry her. So when an escaped Jewish boy arrives on Elsie’s doorstep on Christmas Eve, Elsie understands that opening the door would put all she loves in danger.

Sixty years later, in El Paso, Texas, Reba Adams is trying to file a feel-good Christmas piece for the local magazine, and she sits down with the owner of Elsie's German Bakery for what she expects will be an easy interview. But Reba finds herself returning to the bakery again and again, anxious to find the heart of the story—a story that resonates with her own turbulent past. For Elsie, Reba’s questions are a stinging reminder of that last bleak year of World War II.

As the two women's lives become intertwined, both are forced to confront the uncomfortable truths of the past and seek out the courage to forgive.