A lyrical, intimate portrait of a young woman’s coming of age in a Germany torn apart by the Thirty Years War, Teach the Children to Pray is a novel for anyone who has ever grappled with the question of how to live well in turbulent times.

Pray, children, pray

Tomorrow comes the Swede

Tomorrow comes Oxenstiern’

To teach the children to pray

Pray, children, pray

- German lullaby from the Thirty Years War

1618. A witch hunt forces ten year-old Josefine Dorn and her father to the harsh, unforgiving roads of the Holy Roman Empire. That same year, Bohemian Protestants throw the Emperor’s regents from a castle window, sparking a religious war that soon engulfs the entire Empire. Driven by misfortune and desperation, Josefine’s father enlists, and Josefine follows him into the army’s baggage train.

In the army, Josefine learns to survive, first as a child looking after her soldier father, and later, in the unlikely role of field surgeon, tending to the war’s broken and ailing.

Josefine’s story is entwined with the ordinary people of Germany—men and women; Protestants, Catholics and Jews; believers and unbelievers—as they strive to hold onto what truly matters in spite of plundering armies and narrow-minded princes. Evocatively written and infused with warmth and humanity, Teach the Children to Pray brings to life a richly-drawn cast of characters through the eyes of its striking heroine and her extraordinary story of lost faith, forbidden love, and the search for peace in a time of endless war.

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