Dena Rueb Romero
Dena Rueb Romero grew up in Hanover, New Hampshire, the daughter of a Lutheran mother and a Jewish father, both refugees from Nazi Germany. Her Jewish grandparents were killed in the Holocaust. Although she was raised as a Jew, her parents celebrated both Jewish and Christian holidays. The family traveled regularly to Germany to visit Dena’s Lutheran grandparents, aunts, and uncles. Dena graduated from Brandeis University and received an MA in English from the University of Virginia and an MSW from Boston College Graduate School of Social Work. Previous publications include Gretel’s Albums, a collaborative bilingual Internet project (www.birdstage.net/kleeblatt/) and an essay about German citizenship in A Place They Called Home: Reclaiming Citizenship, Stories of a New Jewish Return to Germany (Berlinica Publishing LLC, 2019).
Books
All for You: A World War II Family Memoir of Love, Separation, and Loss
Emil, a Jewish man in 1930s Germany, loves Deta, a Lutheran, but Nazi racial purity laws forbid their marriage. Desperate to find a place where their love can survive, they must separate to get away. Deta leaves for England, but Emil has to overcome red tape, resistance from his aging parents, and his own ambivalence before he can embark for America. With only telegrams and letters from Deta to sustain him, he does all he can to bring her and his family to America. But the clock is ticking as the war breaks out and the Nazis tighten their stranglehold.
From the heartbreaking news of November 10, 1938 (Kristallnacht) to the horrific revelations after the German surrender in 1945, Emil’s story runs the course of the war. Can he make his way in this new world? Will he be reunited with his beloved Deta? And will he ever see his family again?