By Investigative Reporter Tammy Rose
Some stories refuse to let you go.
This one has followed me for more than two decades—from Wisconsin to Germany, through old photographs, family memories, forgotten records and a documentary that took me back to my family’s home in Berlitt.
I’ve walked where they walked and stood inside the home where part of this story began. For years, I’ve tried to understand what happened to the people in those fading photographs. Their lives, separated by an ocean, would eventually become connected by war.
Now, their story is finally a book.
When Two Worlds Collide During WWII is finally here.
This is more than a World War II story to me. It is the story of two families—one in Germany and one in Wisconsin—whose lives unfolded thousands of miles apart as war changed everything around them.
And somehow, their worlds would eventually collide.
A World War II story inspired by my own family history
When Two Worlds Collide During WWII blends documented family history, real people and real events with dramatized scenes that bring their experiences to life.
The story begins in the 1930s and follows two families on opposite sides of the Atlantic.
In Wisconsin, a young woman born without her left arm refuses to allow the expectations of the era to determine the life she will lead.
In Germany, the Pein family watches the world around them transform under Hitler, war and eventually the Soviet advance.
There are marriages and separations, soldiers and civilians, impossible choices, lost homes and a family struggling to survive the aftermath of a war that changed Europe forever.
At its heart, though, this is a story about family, survival and the extraordinary chain of events that ultimately connected two worlds.
The real people behind the story
One of the most meaningful parts of writing this book was being able to use real family photographs.
These aren’t actors.
They aren’t AI recreations.
They are the actual people whose lives inspired the story.
Some of their experiences survived through documents and photographs. Others survived because family members kept telling the stories.
I spent countless hours trying to piece those fragments together.
There were moments when one photograph, one record or one remembered detail suddenly connected pieces of the story that had been separated for decades.
That became one of my favorite parts of this journey.
From Germany to Wisconsin
The book travels from a small German village to wartime Europe, postwar refugee life and eventually Wisconsin.
The war didn’t simply end for families when the fighting stopped.
Homes were lost. Borders changed. Families were separated. People who had survived the war still had to figure out how to survive the peace that followed it.
For one branch of my family, that journey eventually led across the Atlantic and to a completely new life in America.
Knowing where that journey ultimately led made writing its beginning even more powerful for me.
Why I wrote When Two Worlds Collide During WWII
I wanted to preserve these stories before more of them disappeared.
Family history has a way of becoming smaller with every generation. A story that one person remembers vividly becomes a sentence told by the next generation—and eventually it can disappear altogether.
I didn’t want that to happen to this one.
As a reporter, I’m accustomed to searching for records, questioning details and trying to determine what can actually be documented.
As a writer, I wanted to do something different with those discoveries.
I wanted readers to feel as though they were there.
Because some conversations and moments from nearly a century ago can never be known, portions of the book are dramatized. I explain that distinction for readers in the book while preserving the real names, family history and historical foundation behind the story.
Take When Two Worlds Collide During WWII on your next trip
There is something fitting about reading a story that crosses the Atlantic while traveling yourself.
Whether you’re heading to Germany, Italy or somewhere completely different, this is the kind of book you can tuck into your carry-on and disappear into during a long flight.
If this story inspires a trip of your own, you can search Hotels.com for hotels and places to stay throughout Europe and beyond.
Disclosure: I may earn a commission from qualifying Hotels.com bookings made through links on this website, at no additional cost to you.
Order When Two Worlds Collide During WWII on Amazon
After spending so much time with these people, their photographs and their stories, seeing this book become something readers can actually hold is difficult to put into words.
I hope you fall in love with these families.
I hope parts of their story surprise you.
Most of all, I hope it makes you think about the stories hidden inside your own family—and the people who lived extraordinary lives long before we were here to hear about them.
When Two Worlds Collide During WWII is available now on Amazon.
Thank you to everyone who followed along while I researched, wrote, rewrote, edited and finally sent this story out into the world.
Now it’s yours to read.
Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.