Never by Chance

A work of Jewish themed historical fiction, Never By Chance explores strong times and topics. Set in Europe, England, and America from 1938-1941, it includes: the rise of anti-Semitism in Germany; the voyage of the SS St. Louis, known as the voyage of the damned; the outbreak of World War II in Poland; the early days of the Nazi occupation of France; the Battle of Britain; the formation of Winston Churchill's clandestine spy organization, the SOE structured to set Europe ablaze; the formation of the French Resistance, the Maquis, and the beginning of the systematic extermination of millions of European Jews as they are "transported" to and then die in the Auschwitz death camp. While Never By Chance explores strong times and topics, at its core it is the story of two young people, Jonathan Stone and Kathryn Brotman, one American and the other Czechoslovakian, as they are thrust into World War II and the Holocaust, and then unexpectedly meet at the secret SOE (Special Operations Executive) aerodrome in England's East Anglia where Jonathan is a SOE pilot who flies secret agents into moonlit fields of Nazi Occupied Europe, and Kathryn is a SOE language instructor who trains secret agents to become fluent in the language of the country in which they will be dropped. With their common Jewish backgrounds and their daily involvement in Winston Churchill's clandestine war to set Europe ablaze, they first become friends, and then slowly and inexorably fall in love, Kathryn's will and psychic ability guiding Jonathan to safety after he is gravely wounded during a disastrous aerial bombing raid of Nazi Germany.