The War has affected the lives of the two protagonists: Misha and Alida. Misha is the son of a teenage mother, Blanche, a French Jewess, interned in a Lebensborn Nazi brothel. His father, a Polish Jew on leave from his Ukrainian SS unit, sires a bastard son. Alida is born in Havana, Cuba of French Jewish refugees who fled from the Nazi Vichy government. She reaches her teens as a talented ballerina. Misha earns a PhD degree in spite of his sadistic stepfather and guilt-ridden mom. Further studies lead him to the US. Circumstances bring Misha and Alida together. They marry and take up residence in Urbana-Champaign. Soon, Alida gives birth to a premature baby son and, oddly, undergoes radical hysterectomy. His lover Susanna joins Misha in the US and complications develop. Months later, Susanna's body is recovered from a countryside lake, and Misha is the prime suspect in the first-degree murder trial. A MOTHER'S LAST WORDS, William Samelson's brilliant and baffling novel is set in the US, Germany, Cuba, and Israel during the Six-Day War. It begins with Misha's incarceration accused of Susanna's murder. The jury's verdict is death by lethal injection. Unsuccessful appeals bring us closer to Misha's execution. A Mother's Last Words is both historical and criminal conjecture. It is a chilling portrayal of a cultural climate fraught with greed, random/sinful sexuality, and sinister social habits.