It’s hard to imagine Anne Frank outside the confines of the secret annex where she wrote her diary, playing between the tall buildings of Amsterdam’s River Quarter, where her family moved after the Nazis took over Germany; to picture her playing Ping-Pong with the three other members of the Little Bear Minus Two club; to watch her stopping by the Oasis for ice cream; to see her sitting at her desk at the 6th Montessori School.

For most of us, she’s frozen behind the bookcase that sealed off the Frank family’s secret annex.

After years of painstaking research, bestselling author Alice Hoffman has woven a poignant and heart-rending novel that brings young Anne to life as she copes with a new world closing in on her after the Nazis occupied the Netherlands. As Hoffman shows Anne forced to change schools because Jews were prohibited from sitting in classrooms with Christians, barred from parks and then forbidden from walking outside after 8 PM, she captures Anne’s wit, mischief and uncertainties even as she’s caught up in an inescapable tide of horror.

At a moment when Frank’s story resonates with particular power, Alice Hoffman joins us to discuss When We Flew Away: A Novel of Anne Frank Before the Diary, the research behind it and the lessons that linger.

New York Times bestselling author Alice Hoffman has explored the nooks and crannies of women’s experiences in 30 novels, three collections of short fiction and eight books for young adults.

Hoffman will be in conversation with award-winning journalist and author Sandee Brawarsky.