Surviving Dresden: A Novel about Life, Death, and Redemption in World War II

Surviving Dresden beautifully portrays the poignant and inspiring human struggle between good and evil in the search for peace during the last bloody days of World War II.

On the ground that horrific night is a courageous young Jewish woman, Gisela Kauffmann. Having just received orders to be herded off to a concentration camp, Gisela will do anything to save herself and her family. In the air, RAF bomber Captain Wallace Campbell is torn between his sworn military duty to bomb an unarmed city crowded with refugees, and his growing conviction that total war is immoral.

Surviving Dresden is told through the eyes of Gisela, Wallace, and a compelling cast of characters—a story of personal pain and suffering amid the hope, even as the bombs are falling, of restoring human sanity to a world torn apart.

Masterfully sweeping, Surviving Dresden explores the depths of human courage in facing life and death, with human redemption triumphing.

“An evocative, inventive tale of war and moral judgment. Surviving Dresden vividly brings to life one of the most controversial episodes of the Second World War.”
—Rick Atkinson, Pulitzer Prize winning author of the World War II Liberation Trilogy

“An incredibly suspenseful, powerful story with a redemptive ending. Deserves a wide reading audience, even serious consideration for the big screen. Happy to offer my highest recommendation.”
—Frank Price, Former Chairman and CEO, Columbia Pictures, and Former President, Universal Pictures

James Kirby Martin’s academic teaching career includes stops at Rutgers University, the University of Houston, The Citadel, and the United States Military Academy at West Point. He is the author or editor of fourteen books, including Benedict Arnold, Revolutionary Hero: An American Warrior Reconsidered; A Respectable Army: The Military Origins of the Republic 1763-1789; Forgotten Allies: The Oneida Indians and the American Revolution; and Insurrection: The American Revolution and Its Meaning. Among his professional activities, Martin has served as an historian consultant to the Oneida Indian Nation of New York and a book series advisory editor to Oxford University Press, New York University Press, and Westholme Publishers.

Bob Burris has been a guiding force behind such high profile network television shows as Warner Brothers’ Growing Pains. As a feature film writer and producer, Burris has written and produced a number of successful, inspirational projects. He has worked extensively with the Warner Bros. Writer’s Workshop, nurturing and developing aspiring television and screenwriters, teaching craft and helping them shape their work.