Love and War is a gripping story, and a true one. It happened to Nicholas, who tells it with feeling, sensitivity, humor and honesty. He can recall most of it because he wrote it down at the time in small notebooks that he carried in secret. Book Two of this trilogy (1944-1945) begins with a celebration on the eve of the New Year - 1944 - on the Soviet-German front line. Nicholas and his sweetheart Oksana, their friends and comrades-in-arms hope that their Western Allies will finally open the "Second Front" in Europe and they will see the end of the war they have already been fighting for two and a half years. More horrors - and surprising joys - lie ahead, however, as the Soviet Red Army beats the Nazis westward, back into Germany. Nicholas is with them all the way to the fall of Berlin and collapse of the Third Reich on May 2, 1945.