''Lilya's Story' is the remarkable true story of Ludmila Gavrilovna Natalenko - Lilya - a talented actress born in Russia, as told by her daughter Ksana and son Bohdan. Ludmila's brief but promising career as an actress was cut short by the outbreak of World War II. Occupying German troops overran her village and she was forcibly taken to Germany to face an unknown future. In Berlin she met and fell in love with Boris, a Red Army soldier who was a prisoner-of-war. Together they went on the run throughout Germany and Czechoslovakia. Capture by either the Allies of the Red Army would have meant deportation to Russia, almost certain execution, or imprisonment in Stalin's Siberian labour camps. Many years after the war Ludmila and Boris secured passage on a ship to Australia through an assisted migrant scheme.' (Publication summary)
