Where It All Goes Down
1990s Amsterdam and WWII Oosterbeek, Holland
We get two settings for the price of one here, with Jacob's trip to Amsterdam in the 1990s taking over part of the novel, and Geertrui's time at her home in Oosterbeek during World War II as the other half. Crossing time might be more confusing if the entire book wasn't about the same event, namely World War II.
You've heard of it, right? The novel follows what happens during one specific part of it, in the Battle of Arnhem. It goes a little something like this: Geertrui and Jacob live through the battle in 1944, and then modern-day Jacob comes to visit his grandpa's grave on the anniversary of it.
The setting is super important to our understanding of what's happening in the story, because it's smack dab in the middle of the war zone geographically. Holland was hit pretty hard because it's close to Germany and is relatively small (in comparison)—plus it's right after the Allies assemble and liberate Paris. U.S. forces free Paris from Nazi control on August 25, 1944, and everyone's thinking Holland is next.
When Geertrui starts her story, she tells us it's September 17, 1944, so it's really soon after this big Nazi defeat. Geertrui and Jacob are living through the time when the war is almost over, but not quite.
It's easy for us to look back now and think they are less than a year from when the war ends in 1945, but there's still a lot of bloodshed all around them. Hundreds of people are still fighting for their lives, and they are right in the middle of it all. We think the fact that they are almost to the end of the war makes the story that much sadder. The end is in sight… but they don't get there.
Want to know more about the what's happening in the war? Check out our timeline.