Denise Neuhaus

The Christening Denise Neuhaus

The Christening is the saga of love, intrigue, and betrayal during the collapse of the Soviet Union. In 1973, Piret Anvelt, a young and uneducated Estonian girl, finds herself abandoned by her lover when she becomes pregnant. Her family forces her to give the baby girl to her beautiful cousin Helena, who has recently married. While Piret's daughter grows up across the Baltic in freedom in Sweden, Piret becomes a devout communist party member and Marxist economist. She transforms herself into the perfect Party member and never makes a compromising mistake. When she visits Stockholm as a Soviet official, she discovers that her painful secret has become a tool in the hands of the KGB. She and her child are now pawns in an intricate plot to persecute the man Piret loves. Rather than harm the daughter she has never known, Piret sacrifices her position and privileges and returns home to a life of disgrace. But, in 1991, the USSR is crumbling and Estonia declares independence. Is it too late for Piret to pick up the pieces of her life?