Already not a fan of historical fiction based around the World Wars, this didn't help that opinion. I didn't feel as if I could follow the plot and I felt nothing for any of the characters.

The story is about Natalia Faber, her life from childhood, her schooling in a Ursuline convent in Munich to her trip from her home in Berlin to Prague and then her life during WWII in Prague. Natalia has an eccentric mother Beatriz who takes her out of school to accompany her on one of her many trips. Her mother is as quick to abandon her daughter as she is to pick up new travelling companions. Natalia meets Miklos Count Andojan on this trip and her life changes.
I found the book hard going at times but was invested in finding out how Natalia’s life turns out.
It is a book about love, loss and friendship. It was not the usual historical fiction about the events of WWII but an enjoyable read.

I don't like to give low ratings for ARC books, but have been asked for my honest review, so I feel that I need to rate this book 2 stars, which is 'it was ok' for me. I felt like the book I was reading was different from the book described. I had difficulty keeping track of the character lines, the time lines, and the locations. I hope that will be fixed before printing & publishing.
One issue I had that was not related to the writing, exactly, but did detract from my enjoyment of the book was the narration being in passive voice. I don't enjoy books that give me the gods-eye view of the story, I prefer to be in the story. I felt like I couldn't connect with the characters because I was just watching from afar. But even that isn't fair - you can watch a movie and still understand and identify with characters, but with this book, it was all observation.
I also felt like the story was inconsistent and actually looked to see if there was one or two authors. Some portions were more engaging and I could get into the story a bit more, but then there would be a change and I lost interest in it all again.

Once the book is published and an audio version is available, I might give this another try. I feel like there is a good story somewhere in there, but I couldn't find it.

This was a book I was really looking forward to. But to my dismay it was all over the place. There were to many sudden jumps from flashbacks to present and then storyline failed to hold my attention.

I was really excited for this book based on the description but it dragged for me. I wasn’t able to finish it as I didn’t connect with the character.

Thank you Netgalley for a copy of Midnight Train to Prague in exchange for a review::

I did not enjoy this. I was really looking forward to it, as I love historical fiction and love Berlin, but those loves were soon ignored as I couldn’t get a handle of this book. It was all-over the place.

First of all, it didn’t help that the majority of the story was told in the passive (tell). There was a lot of: ‘When they finished doing this, X did this and Y then did that.’ Pages and pages of tell. Very little active/ present voice. I felt like I had a narrator standing behind me telling me things I was already watching.
It also didn’t help that there was lots of backstory. In fact, on the very first page, the hopping back and forth between present and past was rather jarring.

I might give the book a “re-read” when the audiobook comes out, I don’t know why, but that sometimes helps polish out the bumps that I, as a reader, experience.

Loved the book the people and you feel like you are in the countries with them sad emotional funny all rolled into one

On what should have been a simple train trip from Berlin to Prague with her mother in1927, Natalia Faber learns the truth about father, whom she believed died when she was a baby. She also meets two people who will become central to her life, Magdalena Schaefer and Count Miklos Andorjan , the man she will later marry. Years later, with the onset of World War II, Natalia finds herself in a Prague waiting for Miklos to return from the fighting at the front. There she meets Anna Schafer, the daughter of the woman she met in 1927. The Nazis send Anna to a concentration camp for spying and Natalia is left bereft. This is a story of sacrifice and loss, something most of us are just beginning to experience in our own lives. This story will put our petty predicaments to shame