In a riveting exploration of the power the past wields over the present, critically acclaimed author Antoinette van Heugten writes the story of a woman whose child???s life hangs in the balance, forcing her to confront the roots of her family???s troubled history in the dark days of World War II???

It???s the stuff of nightmares: Nora de Jong returns home from work one ordinary day to find her mother has been murdered. Her infant daughter is missing. And the only clue is the body of an unknown man on the living-room floor, clutching a Luger in his cold, dead hand.

Frantic to find Rose, Nora puts aside her grief and frustration to start her own search. But the contents of a locked metal box she finds in her parents??? attic leave her with as many questions as answers???and suggest the killer was not a stranger. Saving her daughter means delving deeper into her family???s darkest history, leading Nora half a world away to Amsterdam, where her own unsettled past and memories of painful heartbreak rush back to haunt her.

As Nora feverishly pieces together the truth from an old family diary, she???s drawn back to a city under Nazi occupation, where her mother???s alliances may have long ago sealed her own???and Rose???s???fate.

A former international trial lawyer, van Heugten spent 15 years practising all over the world, primarily in Scandinavia, Germany and the Netherlands, as well as in Houston, her hometown. She's a graduate of the University of Texas in Austin, Texas, where she earned her undergraduate and law degrees.
The Tulip Eaters is van Heugten's second novel. Her debut novel, Saving Max, was a USA Today bestseller, translated into six languages and received much critical acclaim.