In 1951, Liesel Steffen, then nine, remembered her father as a good and loving man.

David Forbes

A botanist and teacher, he would give food to refugees. He would take her on nature walks through the German countryside, read her fairy tales and constantly challenge her to examine the world for herself.

He was also a Nazi.

In fact, he was not simply a Nazi in the sense that many at the time were ó conscripted or forced young to serve a nightmare creed. No, Lieselís father was an enthusiastic supporter of Hitlerís fascist nightmare. He joined the party in 1933, shouted ìHeil Hitler!î when she was born and waxed ecstatic about providing another child for the Fuehrer.

Then, in 1951, a Jewish man returns to her small German town and tells her that on Kristallnacht, her father saved his son from certain death. Proud, she takes him in to meet her mother, who quickly sends the man away.

Her idyllic childhood shattered, that moment begins a harrowing odyssey of guilt, discovery and identity that forms the core of Liesel Appelís ìThe Neighborís Sonî (Infinity Publishing, 401 pp. $19.95)

One good, thorough edit away from perfection, this book nonetheless remains a powerful story ó and one that I found I couldnít put down.

Appel, who makes her home in this area and converted to Judaism in 1990, spent many years trying to deny her background and throwing herself into other causes, including African nationalism, before finally coming to some sort of peace.

Nazis have often become stock villains to those of my generation, born some three or four decades after the last shot of World War II was fired. ìThe Neighborís Sonî provides an invaluable perspective. There is evil here, but itís in the last places you will ever expect.

Whether as a glimpse into the lingering poison hatred leaves even on those barely young enough to remember it, or as a reality check on the severity of the problems we all face, images and scenes from this book ended up staying with me after I set it down.

After reading this, if anyone tells you that their minor squabbles with family or trouble finding an apartment constitutes an existential crisis, please set them straight.

Appelís writing style is sparse, effective and simple. This allows the compelling events of her life to come through.

And on that count, thereís practically no end. Even after the fateful visit by her former neighbor, Lieselís life involves her brotherís miraculous desertion from the German navy, her own entanglement in the brutal Congolese infighting of the 1960s, racial prejudice and corruption in Palm Beach and a succession of failed love affairs.

Throughout, it doesnít have the fictionalized feel that many memoirs end up with. Appel readily sees her own flaws and ardently refuses to package the twisting paths of life into easy resolutions. That unflinching honesty gives the uplifting moments the reality they need and the punch-in-the-gut revelations the impact they demand.

Her search, decades-long by now, continues today, as Appel, the last living member of her immediate family, seeks to end her long quest by finding the neighborís son.

The scenes where she searches on the barest rumor are some of the hardest to read, as she not only digs back through layers of painful memories, but does so with no easy or certain point of resolution in sight.

The only flaw this book has is that it needed a more thorough edit. I found my attention occasionally jarred by an awkward phrase, misspelling or incorrect word use. Thatís unfortunate, as the events here deserve the best telling they can get.

I hope a subsequent edition (for this is a story that certainly begs for one), cleans some of this up and brings ìThe Neighborís Sonî to the level it deserves.

Even so, it is a reminder that lifeís stories not only are stranger than fiction, but they have a habit of never really ending at all ó and who knows what the next chapter will reveal?
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David Forbes, who writes book reviews and covers news for the Daily Planet, may be reached at marauderAVL-at-hotmail.com. Suggestions and comments are always welcome.