***FINALIST - The Kindle Book Review Best Indie Books of 2012*** Arnhem, September 1944.
British Parachute Regiment Captain Sammy Parker and his platoon have fought bravely, but it was always a losing battle...the bridge they were sent to capture was unwinnable. After he and his men are forced into cattle trucks and transported across Germany on a three day journey without food or water, Sammy lashes out at an SS officer with brutal and devastating consequences...
Instead of spending the rest of his war as a POW, Sammy is sent to a concentration camp.
Spared an immediate death, he discovers first-hand the full horror of the final solution. Amongst the desperation and destitution of the camp, he encounters Naomi, a Jewish housewife from Dresden. Having seen her family murdered, Naomi has learned to survive by making the most unimaginable sacrifices. She is the woman who Sammy will come to depend on to survive himself.
But when the camp is finally liberated, the couple are separated and Sammy embarks on a journey across a continent devastated by war and wracked by ongoing tensions to find out what happened to the woman he loves.
"Powerful, raw and emotive" The Kindle Book Review
"An intriguing story, gripping from the first page to the last and full of sorrow, happiness, kindness and heartbreak"Zohar Laor, ManOfLaBook.com
"A marvellously panoramic story of how individuals dealt with the devastation of war"Damaskcat, amazon.co.uk Top 50 Reviewer
About the Author: William Edward Thomas was born in West London in 1925. He left The Brompton Oratory School when he was 14 and started work as a messenger at the BBC. When war broke out, he went to work with his father at a factory in Harrow. While still a teenager, William joined the army and was soon recruited in to the Parachute Regiment. By May 1945, he had been "dropped" in to a number of key battles and become a much decorated soldier. He was still only 19 years old. Following the war, William served in Palestine until 1948. William has six children. As they were growing up, he was working and studying in shifts as a merchant seaman and an engineer. In his mid fifties, he decided to work full time as a lab technician at his Alma Mater, The Open University and remained there until his retirement. It was during his retirement that he decided to set himself the challenge of writing a novel. The Cypress Branches is the result. William's health started deteriorating shortly after finishing The Cypress Branches and he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease in 2006. After a decade-long battle against the illness, William passed away peacefully in February 2014, surrounded by his family. He was 88.
