The Cut Out Girl

The Cut Out Girl by Bart van Es has won the Costa Book of the Year 2018. Described as 'extraordinary' by the judges, The Cut Out Girl is the harrowing true story of a young girl's struggle to survive Nazi persecution, and a man's attempt to unveil his family's secrets.

Little Lien wasn't taken from her Jewish parents - she was given away in the hope that she might be saved. Hidden and raised by a foster family in Amsterdam during the Nazi occupation, she survived the war only to find that her real parents had not. Much later, she fell out with her foster family, and Bart van Es - the grandson of Lien's foster parents - knew he needed to find out why. His account of tracing Lien and telling her story is a searing exploration of two lives and two families. It is a story about love and misunderstanding and about the ways that our most painful experiences - so crucial in defining us - can also be redefined.