Forger of Marseille: A Novel

All across Europe in 1939, the Nazis are coming for Jews and anti-fascists. The only way to avoid being imprisoned or murdered is to assume a new identity. For that you need papers. And for that the underground needs forgers. In Paris, Julia, a young Jewish artist from Berlin and Mr. Lieb, her father figure, meet Cesar, a Spanish Republican who knows well the brutality of fleeing fascism. He soon recognizes that Julia is gifted with a pen, and decides that she will become his underground’s new forger.The war reaches Paris, so the trio joins thousands of other refugees in a chaotic exodus south. In Marseille, they’re received by friends and learn that the collaborationist government is hunting enemies and refugees. It’s a hit list that includes Jewish and anti-fascist artists, writers, and scientists who have thus far escaped the Reich. Julia continues her forgery work in the shadows, expertly creating false papers that for many will mean the difference between life and a horrifying death. When Mr. Lieb is arrested and imprisoned in Les Milles, Julia, Cesar, and their friends vow to rescue him. Also in Marseille, the American journalist Varian Fry plots the escapes of high-profile people like Andre Breton and Marc Chagall. Can Julia persuade him to also help her beloved Mr. Lieb? In this enlightening and thrilling story of war, love, and courage, author Linda Joy Myers explores identity, ingenuity, and the power of art to save lives.
In Paris at the beginning of World War II, Julia, a young Jewish artist, discovers she has a gift for forgery. She’s only nineteen, and outrunning Nazis again. With two men she loves, she escapes to Marseille and joins a secret network dedicated to saving political refugees, writers, and artists from arrest by Hitler’s Gestapo—but will passion and cunning be enough to keep them all alive?