The Remnants: One Family's Escape from Stalin's Russia ^Featured

“If we don’t leave now, we may never get out.”

Lena and Nikolai Siemens dream of a simple life on the steppes of 1920s Crimea—farming their land, raising their children, and practicing their Mennonite faith in peace.

But as Stalin’s iron fist closes around Russia’s German Mennonite communities, Lena and Nikolai flee toward Moscow in a desperate bid for freedom. Surrounded by thousands of fellow refugees, they wait in disease-ridden camps, watching children die while bureaucrats deny their exit visas again and again.

After months of uncertainty, Nikolai is arrested. Lena takes refuge in a maternity home. And three-year-old Kolja is deported back to Crimea, fifteen hundred miles away.

Then the miracle happens: Exit visas. But only for forty-eight hours. No time to reach Kolja before the door closes forever.

Now Lena and Nikolai face an unbearable choice: Escape with their newborn and trust their family will be reunited . . . or stay in Russia and risk the wrath of Stalin.