For decades Anne Frank’s Diary of a Young Girl has inspired and challenged readers to look for the good in an often-brutal world. 

In today’s episode, critically acclaimed author, Alice Hoffman, joins host Suzanne McCabe to talk about her newest young adult novel When We Flew Away: A Novel of Anne Frank Before the Diary, which reimagines the life of Anne Frank before she wrote her famous diary. This gripping and lyrical novel, informed by extensive research and extraordinary support from the Anne Frank Center, captures the highs, lows, and unyielding hope of Anne and her family during the harrowing Nazi occupation in the Netherlands. Amid danger, deprivation, and countless indignities, a young Anne Frank discovers who she is and cultivates the writer within her.

In addition to When We Flew Away, Alice Hoffman has written over thirty works of fiction, including The Dovekeepers, The World That We Knew, and Practical Magic to name a few. 

About Alice Hoffman: Learn more about the author and her many novels.

When We Flew Away: A Novel of Anne Frank Before the Diary: Check out Alice Hoffman’s latest novel about Anne Frank before her writing her famous diary.

Hope From the Holocaust: Suzanne McCabe speaks with authors Neal Shusterman and Sharon Cameron about their latest novels Courage to Dream: Tales of Hope in the Holocaust, and Artifice.

The Tower of Life: Suzanne McCabe talks with author Chana Stiefel about The Tower of Life: How Yaffa Eliach Rebuilt Her Town in Stories and Photographs. 

Alice Hoffman, author, When We Flew Away: A Novel of Anne Frank Before the Diary

“A lot of other people and teenagers wrote diaries, but [Anne Frank’s], I think, kind of transcends just being her personal story. It feels much more universal. And I think also that she was a fantastic writer. So she was a great writer. And so I think her voice reminds us, because it's so innocent and so helpful that, I think it has to come in many ways for us, the Holocaust, because it's a story that she will not let us forget.”

“For one, I would hope that [readers of When We Flew Away] they would want to go read the diary. And for the other part, I hope that they would want to read about somebody who really had hope in the world, despite the cruelty, despite the war, who really felt that people were good at heart and that it was still possible to change the world.”

“I thought there might be lots of young readers who wouldn't know anything about [Anne Frank], wouldn't even know who she was. So, I think as you're reading [When We Flew Away], you're seeing that the world is closing in and you're having a sense that, there's not going to be a positive ending for the Jews in the Netherlands, but you really kind of want to find out what happens to [Anne]. How does she get through it? How does somebody manage to stumble, live that life is worth living.”

Producer: Maxine Osa

Sound engineer: S. Shin 

Music composer: Lucas Elliot Eberl

Rebecca Elliot with guest host Billy DiMichele