When the Berlin Wall went up, Gerta, her mother, and her brother Fritz are trapped on the eastern side where they were living, while her father, and her other brother Dominic are in the West--four years later, now twelve, Gerta sees her father on a viewing platform on the western side and realizes he wants her to risk her life trying to tunnel to freedom.

"The Kidd children--including twelve-year-old twins Rebecca and Bickford--follow mysterious clues that take them from China to Germany, in the hopes of finding their missing father and the treasure that will finally free their kidnapped mother"--

Elizabeth's mother works at Dresden Zoo, where her favorite animal is an elephant named Marlene. When the zoo director tells her the dangerous animals must be shot to prevent them running amok when the town is bombed, Elizabeth's mother moves Marlene into the back garden to save her.

In 1884, the Westland family arrives to settle in the harsh country of San Juan County, Utah, and works hard to make a life as the 19th century comes to a close. In 1908, the Schutze family raises their children and milks their cows in Graswang Village, Germany. For both families, although they don't know it, events are moving them and their world toward World War I.

With Everland and Umberland destroyed, Gwen, Pete, and Alyssa and the other survivors have taken refuge in Evergreen Village in the forest, where they plot to assassinate the Bloodred Queen, while trying to avoid her monstrous creations, and Doc works onhis cure for the Horologia virus--but with the Queen of England dead, and the King of Germany either dead or hidden away, who can they trust to save their devastated world?

"In the second volume of bestselling author Gerald N. Lund's explosive new series, the Eckhardt family finds that the turmoil in their lives will only increase as they try to move froward in a nation divided. Seargeant Hans Eckhardt has been discharged from his military service and wants nothing more than to start a new life with a career and a family, but the unrest swallowing his homeland seems determined to stop him. Suffering the devastating impact...