In this honest and deeply moving book, we share the emotions, the hopes and fears, of a doctor's family in Germany during the last days of World War II and the beginning of the American occupation. Through Karin Lorenz, the doctor's nearly seventeen-year-old daughter, the family is invited to stay with a young and dedicated minister, Pastor Helmut Lobelius, in a village away from the direct path of the oncoming U.S. Army and the Allied bombers. Dr. Lorenz wants his wife and daughter and his young son Till to be as far removed from danger as possible. So Karin's dearest wish comes true. Now, daily, she will see Helmut, with whom—despite a great difference in age and background—she has fallen deeply in love.

There, in the medieval village of Eberstein, this many-faceted story unfolds. It is a story of young love and of bittersweet sacrifice made all the more poignant by the surrounding tragedy and brutality. But Dangerous Spring is more than that. It is a finely wrought, fully realized portrayal of a time and a place, of people who show immense courage or great cowardice, and of the human spirit triumphant.

Drawing on her own first-hand experience, Mrs. Benary—as readers of The Ark and Castle on the Border will know—writes with such vitality and such deep compassion that her characters achieve complete reality. This is an outstanding novel for young adults.

From the dust jacket

Author's Note:

The historical events in this book are based on my own and my husband's diaries of this period. This is exactly how we lived through the last days of the war. So, as an historical document, it has the positive truth of personal experience, along with possible bias of personal feelings. The story, however, and the characters are entirely ficitional.

From the book