This is my first read by this author and I can see why he is so beloved. He is very detailed and writes such beautiful language. I will say that this work of historical fiction took me a bit of time to really get into the flow of the story.

It is the tale of four women, four stories, set in four different time periods. I liked this concept, but it was at times a bit confusing and jarring. I felt a bit cheated out of some of the stories of certain characters.

The cover is amazing and I'm sure many historical fiction and readers drawn to Cuban culture will be captivated by this book.

Many thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for allowing me access to this work in exchange for my honest review.

The Night Travelers treads lightly on the familiar ground of The German Girl. Again we have the story of Ally, a mother saving her daughter Lilith from genocide by sending her to Cuba. Lilith repeats her mother’s sacrifice, sending her daughter Nadine from Cuba’s communism for New York, and then Nadine’s daughter Luna returns to Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall to learn about her family. This book takes us through four generations rather than two and seems more appropriate for a mini-series where that one felt like a movie.



The Night Travelers seems as though it would make a good mini-series with perhaps one night per generation. It is possible actors, by dint of being different people, would add more to the characters who are somewhat flat. For example, four different women growing up in different countries and in different eras should sound and act differently. I should be able to know who is speaking by their voice, not their words. Generations are not duplicates, but new castings. There just was too little differentiation in the women.

The plot is interesting, though, already familiar from The German Girl. IAs with that book, his inspiration comes from the voyage of the St. Louis, a refugee ship that was turned away by the Cuban, American, and Canadian governments, forced to return to Germany where many of its passengers died in the Holocaust. Lucas Correa, a Cuban writer living in exile, has been inspired by the stories of the 28 passengers allowed to debark in Cuba. For more about the St. Louis, there is quite a bit at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum website. [ Click here to read.]

I received an e-galley of The Night Travelers from the publisher through NetGalley

The Night Travelers at Atria | Simon & Schuster
Armando Lucas Correa author site

Told in several sections following the women of one family from pre-WWII Germany through Cuba and New York and back to Germany in nearly present day, this historical fiction story brings lesser known events to life. Hitler's opinion on mixed-race children, Cuba accepting and then turning away a ship full of Jewish refugees, and the treatment of Nazis long after the war are all touched on as this one family is torn apart and reunited in different ways. I never felt like I was reading a translated piece of fiction, and though the events were traumatic I never felt traumatized as I read it.

“By night, we’re all the same color…”

Ally is a young German woman who falls for a black musician during a dangerous time. She gives birth to Lilith but is concerned about the racial purity laws that would require her daughter to be sterilized. She decides to send Lilith as a young girl to Cuba with a Jewish family also escaping the country. This is a multigenerational story about Ally’s family from Nazi Germany to The Cuban Revolution and then the fall of the Berlin Wall. The family is affected in various and profound ways by war.

I love historical fiction and love reading WWII settings in general. This was a well researched heavy read. My complaint is it could have been so much more emotional but it was factual and to the point most of the time. I wanted to feel more for the characters but I had a hard time connecting.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an arc for review.

Armando Lucas Correa is a wonderful storyteller, always putting a different spin on WWII Germany, and I love learning about Cuba.
The Night Travelers is no different. Told in three different timelines and four generations of women, this story will keep you up at night.

The Night Travelers is a deeply engrossing and emotional story that will fully transport you into the lives and times of four generations of amazing women who lived through some of the most tragic periods in our modern history.

What appealed to you the most in this story?

I loved how Correa transported me not only through time and to different countries with his detailed and atmospheric writing, but also drew my emotions into the story and lives of the characters from the very beginning. I could feel and emphasize with how the bonds between a mother and her child were presented in the story and the lengths any mother would go to in order to protect her child.

Did the author do their research?

I learned so much more about the eugenics program the Nazi’s developed before and during the war along with learning so much more about the Cuban Revolution. Correa really did his homework and even included a bibliography for those who may want to learn more after reading this book.

How was the pace?

This story held a steady pace and kept me turning the pages.

Do you recommend this book?

Talk about an intriguing story that will really touch your heart while taking you on an unimaginable journey. This is definitely one to pick up if you love historical fiction, and its a perfect book for discussion.

Thank you, Atria and NetGalley, for this gifted copy in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you NetGalley and Atria Books for accepting my request to read and review The Night Travelers.

Author: Armando Lucas Correa
Published: 01/10/23
Genre: General Fiction (Adult)

This didn't work for me. Frankly, I was bored from the beginning. It all came back to a young child giving adult thoughts, and I couldn't find any realism in the writing. And now I have a couple problems: I didn't like any of the characters. I couldn't connect. Next, there is a lot of history to be told in less than 350 pages. When I asked to read this book, I didn't calculate the years of history, and that was my error.

With this being a General Fiction genre and not Historical Fiction genre, I went with 2.5 stars rounding up. I wanted more history, I knew very little about Cuba, and I still know very little. I'm not certain I would have liked the book anymore had I recognized the genre, however, I do know I would not have been disappointed when the historical content was missed.

This historical fiction novel spans the years of 1931 to 2015, focusing on four generations of women with time spent in Germany, Cuba, and the United States (briefly). There are plenty of historical events during that time period and the book touches on a lot of it – Hitler’s Nazis, the Cuban Revolution, the Nazi war crime trials, and the falling of the Berlin Wall to name a few. I really enjoyed the 1st two parts of the story, but the 3rd part just seemed to drag on a bit more.

Something I’m embarrassed to say I learned, was the effect Nazi’s had on people of color during that time. The focus has always been on the treatment and murders of the Jews, so it never occurred to me that black and biracial individuals were effected as well. Obviously, not at the same level of magnitude but their treatment wasn’t any different because they didn’t fit in to Hitler’s “purity” vision either. I guess in my mind, Germany was just all white at that time. I need to go relearn some history.

Favorite quote – “There’s no better way to welcome someone than with books.”

Thank you to NetGalley and Atria Books for gifting me with an advanced copy to read and review.

The Night Travelers by Armando Lucas Correa is a touching story that follows four generations of women and the sacrifices made to ensure the future of the next. Allie is a young woman in pre-war Germany. Her young daughter Lilith is of mixed blood race and therefore considered inferior to the new German regime. In order to save her, Allie sends her away to Cuba with another family. Lilith grows up and finds love, only to have it snatched from her due to the Cuban revolution. Her daughter Nadine in turn has to make hard choices, especially as she and her daughter Luna discover more about their history as the years progress. An enthralling story that will keep you reading until the end, you will then wish it hadn't ended. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the chance to read this book. I very much enjoyed it!

By Night, We Are All the Same Color

Ally Keller, a young poet, didn't know that her actions would influence through four generations. In pre world war Germany Ally falls in love with a black musician. With her boyfriend missing she gives birth to a mixed race girl named Lillian. With the Nazi's coming to power with the help of a young man Franz she sends her young daughter with a Jewish couple to Havana, Cuba to keep her safe disguising her as their Jewish daughter.

In Havana Lillian grows up with the Jewish couple as her parents. She meets Martin a young pilot and they are married. They were happy until the Cuban revolution and her husband was arrested and thrown in jail for supporting the government when the resistance took over Cuba. In panic and desperation she works with the Catholic church to send her daughter, Nadine, to a foster family in New York to keep her safe from the violence.

In New York, Nadine grows up and she is led to believe that her parents have both died in Cuba. She grows up with her foster family and is happy until one day an old secret comes back to haunt her foster mother and her life changes.

She gets past this and she meets and marries. It is only when her own daughter questions the past that she really finds out the truth of her life, and that of her mother and her grandmother.

It is a story of war, turmoil, and a mother's love for her child to the point that she will give up her child and any life they might have together to keep her child safe and to give her child a chance at a life.

This is a book of courage and of secrets and a past that comes back to haunt and finally resolution. It was a good story and I would recommend it.

Thanks to Armando Luca Correa for writing a great book, to Atria books for publishing it, and to NetGalley for providing me with a copy to read and review.

Historical fiction has always been fascinating to me. I get lost in the stories and I'm learning at the same time. While the stories are fiction, they are based on real happenings and are usually very well researched. WWII stories can be so challenging to read because of the absolute evil and horror of that time. But, the stories of bravery, resilience and survival are so captivating.

The Night Travelers tells the story of four generations of women, starting with Ally Keller in 1930's Germany, who has to make the unthinkable decision to send her daughter away in order to protect her from Germany's "racial hygiene" laws. The story moves through history into the present day, where we see the impact that decision had on Ally Keller's daughter and the generations after her.

The Night Travelers is beautifully written. It is haunting and tragic, yet there were times of great light and love that you hoped would never go away, but feared would. The Night Travelers demonstrates how the devastation of the Nazi regime and the war, moving into the Cuban revolution, reverberated through time and the long-lasting impact it had on families, even to present day.

Ally put her daughter, Lilith, on a boat to Cuba to escape Germany. But Cuba had its own history of unrest, which ultimately threatened Lilith's family. I admit, I did not know much about the history of Cuba and how communism and Fidel Castro came to power in Cuba, so I found this part of the story simultaneously fascinating and horrific.

The story is told in 3 parts, by Ally, her daughter Lilith and Lilith's daughter Nadine. There are some flashbacks in the story, but they were necessary to tell the story from that characters point of view. Lilith's story took us through her life in Cuba until she had a daughter of her own. I found this part lagged ever so slightly. But the ending left me about as satisfied as you could be with such a tragic story.

If you are a fan of historical fiction, this book is definitely worth a read.

This novel follows four generations of women. It begins in Berlin in 1931 with Ally Keller and her mixed-race daughter Lilith. Ally tries to hide her daughter, but as she grows, Ally must hatch a plan for Lilith to escape Hitler's notion of a pure, Aryan race. The story continues with Lilith's life in her new home, Cuba, with her new family and few memories of Germany. Lilith falls for pilot Martin. They find themselves at a dangerous crossroads at the beginning of the Cuban revolution, and they must send their young daughter, Nadine, to the US. The story's third generation follows Nadine (and her daughter Luna), a scientist dedicated to preserving the dignity of the remains of all those murdered by the Nazis.

This novel was a LOT. A lot of emotion, a lot of sadness, a lot of loss, a lot of terror, a lot of love, and a lot of hardship. I loved that this novel spanned SO many different years, times, events, and people. I did struggle a little with the drastic time jumps from chapter to chapter, but with such a novel, I don't know how it could have been structured any other way. My heart broke for Ally and her loss. My heart ached for Lilith and HER losses. My heart wrenched for Nadine finding Franz... and it soared when Luna comforted her mother and led her to some self-discovery. Nadine and Luna were my favorites.

This novel is so incredibly complex that I'm having trouble putting it to words, to be honest. These women faced so many impossible choices that it became hard to read sometimes. But history is not always pretty. It's devastating and horrible. But this book NEEDS to be read - these stories DEMAND to be told. They paint a beautiful portrait of love, loss, sacrifice, and family. I was in tears. I laughed. I smiled. I hurt. When an author can elicit all of those reactions in one novel, I think that's a sign of a book well-written.

Definitely a must-read for historical fiction lovers.

Such a hard story to read just because of the time frame the story was written. When Ally had to send her daughter Lilith to Cuba with the Herzogs that broke my heart. Then to see history repeat itself was even more heartbreak. How much could this family have to suffer.

The strength of the line of women in this story was phenomenal.

The characters and scenes were so well developed I felt I was there in person.

This was a great story! If I could give it more than five stars I definitely would!

The Night Travelers by Armando Lucas Correa is an amazing woven tale of 4 generations of women and how the decisions each makes affects future generations.
In 1931 in Nazi ruled Germany , Ally, unmarried and pregnant with a mixed race child must make some decisions.
The generations continue through war in Cuba and Germany split by Berlin Wall.
Each generation faces tough decisions about motherhood.
Surprises occur along the way!
Highly recommend!

Thank you to netgalley for the ebook!

I really enjoyed this book. I struggled with how to rate it, because honestly reading a Historical Fiction after The Three Lives of Alix St. Pierre is just not fair. This book was incredibly well done. The characters and their lives are intriguing. The emotions run wild while reading this book. I became fully invested in their lives and relationships.

The story follows 4 women during different times. They are all on a journey of self discovery, both as women and mothers. Berlin 1931 follows Ally Keller, who gives birth to a mixed race daughter, Lilith. She sends her daughter across the ocean to keep her safe from the Nazis. Havana 1958, follows Lilith as an adult. Lilith finds herself and her daughter, Nadine at a crossroads with many risks in Cuba. Berlin 1988, flows Nadine. Nadine, encouraged by her daughter Luna, works to uncover the truth about her family history - the difficult decisions made and the betrayals that will change everything she thought that she once knew.

Thank you Netgalley for my advanced reader copy.

I was provided a free advanced copy of this from @netgalley in exchange for my honest review.
This is a family saga following four generations of women from the early 1930s in Germany, to the 50s in Cuba, to the fall of the Berlin wall in the 80s. This is a story of the sacrifices we make for the ones we love, specifically between a mother and daughter. It's about misunderstanding and forgiveness, joy and grief, secrets and revealing truths. This was definitely a story that clearly shows the effects of history repeating itself!
I struggled a bit with the pacing and feeling like I would get to know characters and be invested in them to only move on without them. However, I appreciated how connections and new information from the past started to be revealed at the end. That's when it started to get better for me. Overall it may have lost some stars for me just due to the overall sadness of the story. This is the third book I've read this year and all three were sad/depressing. So, if it's just been a bit of a downer. If I had read this at a different time, I may have rated it at least a star higher.
It was published this past week, so if you are a fan of historical fiction or family epics, check this one out!
#TheNightTravelers #NetGalley

I read this book in one day! This book initially appealed to me because it followed several generations. As I read, several elements kept me rooted to my seat and held my attention. One was the prose. While the book deals with dark and disturbing events, the author didn't weigh his prose down with perpetual gravitas. The emotionally weighted descriptions were kept for when the events called for them. The second thing that appealed to me was the scope. The characters allow the reader to experience WWII via the concentration on racial purity, the Cuban Revolution and Operation Peter Pan, the separation of Berlin via the Berlin Wall, and the retributions sought for those who committed war crimes. There was a thread of generational trauma and how it was ultimately broken by addressing the past. None of the characters are developed to the fullest extent possible but all of them have enough of their lives exposed for the reader to understand the heart of why they ultimately made the decisions they did. A fantastically powerful read.

I received a copy of this title via NetGalley.

This story follows four generations of women. Ally has a mixed race daughter in 1939 Germany and to protect her from the eugenics program she sends her to Cuba with a Jewish couple. Lilith has a daughter, Nadine. This is during the revolution and after the arrest of her husband Lilith, with the help of the Catholic Church, sends her out of the country to live with a German couple in New York City. Nadine and her family subsequently go back to Germany to live where she has her daughter, Luna.

There was a lot to be covered in about 350 pages, Germany in the late 1930's just when Hitler is coming to power. Lilith's time in Cuba covers the revolution and Castro's coming to power. I really don't know much about the history and wasn't explained in detail. I never quite connected with any of the women except perhaps Ally. The others were children and then they were adults. Lilith and Nadine didn't grow up with loving families and it had to be confusing for them moving to very different cultures and needing another language. Nadine was a scientist and her job was identifying the remains of people killed during the war. Again, that would have been fascinating but just barely touched on. Luna's story was particularly confusing for me as her and her mom are discovering the past so all the names from the beginning are coming back into play and Ally is sometimes referred to has grandmother if Nadine is talking and great-grandmother if it is Luna's perspective. I found it best to just read and hope it all fell into place. I found the ending kind of blah. It's not a bad book. I felt like it could have been great but it just kept missing the mark.

I would like to thank Netgalley and Atria for providing me with a digital copy.

Title: The Night Travelers
Author: Armando Lucas Correa
Genre: Historical Fiction

My Review:

The Night Travelers is a story of generations of a family. It is a story of how a ripple can cause an affect for the future generations. Ally, Lillith, Nadine and Luna are bound by a bond but they need to unravel their story to start living or letting go.

This novel is phenomenal and fantastic. The characters are so well scoped that my heart hurted for them. Excellently researched we get to see a Nazi Germany, a conflicted Cuba, Germany split and reunified. It spans generations of family as well as families who try to help them. Some of these people are traumatized by their own losses and some have committed crimes.

Intergenerational trauma is very real and the author has captured the nuances of it perfectly in this novel. It was a very hard book to read for me and it's been a while that cried after a book was done. The pain of these characters and their lack of emotions makes so much sense with the trauma that they have suffered. Being a trauma survivor myself, I hurt for these women. The closure that they get at the end is beautiful but at the same time sad. This book will stay with me for a long time.

This is a beautifully told story about mothers and daughters and what mothers will do to save their daughters. The story follows four generations of women through catastrophic situations. It is intense, heartbreaking and inspiring.