The Interpreter

Set during the occupation of France of 1940-44 during which time the author fought as a member of the resistance. The story follows her interrogation, imprisonment, and subsequent unexpected release by the German Nazi Officer Frank Van Heugen, the official interpreter in the German Kommandatur of Vichy France. Intrigued when after the war the same man is awarded the Croix de la Résistance by Général de Gaulle, Marcelle Kellermann discovered that The Interpreter had been a German anti-Nazi double agent and decided to write about the life she imagines he must have led, always in great personal danger, covertly working day and night with the French resistance movement and the Allies under the watchful eyes of the Wehrmacht. A story by turn both tragic and at times darkly humorous, each chapter can be regarded as a short episode in its own right detailing this remarkable anti-hero's life and his struggle for humanity during Europe's darkest hour.