The Tattooist of Auschwitz author Heather Morris speaks to Laura Reid about the real life story behind her powerful new novel, The Piano Teacher of Montparnasse.
Published 12th Oct 2026, 16:50 BST
An intrigued Heather heeded his words, uncovering a story that is both heart-breaking and uplifting. Her forthcoming book The Piano Teacher of Montparnasse reimagines a tale of ordinary people in extraordinary times, inspired by real events and people, including Kara’s grandma.
The new novel captures the bravery of French Resistance operatives, and a piano teacher willing to risk everything to save a young girl. In 1942, the Nazis come for a Jewish family living in Montparnasse, occupied Paris. In the chaos of their arrest, eleven-year-old Josie flees to the only person she trusts: her piano teacher, Andrée Levallois, secretly an operative in the French Resistance. Andrée takes her in as a member of the family, spreading their rations and risking everything to keep her safe. But soon the authorities close in, and both Andrée and Josie are caught in a desperate race to stay alive.
Heather, who is speaking at Raworths Harrogate Literature Festival later this month on the date the book is released, visited Kara in LA, setting eyes on the 120-year-old piano and hearing about its significance when it came to her grandmother’s survival during the Second World War.
“Kara told me that she had inherited a piano from her grandmother, and all her life her grandmother had taught her to play. Her grandmother had shared bits of her story as a child in Paris. And the significant thing that Kara had taken away from her grandmother was that this piano had saved her life.
“That was her repeat - it had saved my life. And by that (her grandmother) meant that when she was living with the piano teacher who owned the piano, she got to play it every day and she used it to drown out the noises of the war and the occupation and the noises in her head at having lost her entire family and wondering where they were. It was the piano that she went to, to be able to get that solace and to find a degree of comfort.”
Working with a historian, Heather explored wartime archives, finding testimonies of the piano teacher and her mother. They also managed to track down Andrée’s granddaughter “so I got to spend time with her and get the story from the other side – the piano teacher as well as the pupil”.
“It's a story about love, but for me it's also about sacrifice. The sacrifice of that young girl's mother to send her 11-year-old daughter away from her in the middle of winter in the early hours of the morning in the hope that she could survive.
"What an incredible sacrifice for a mother to make. And the sacrifice of Andrée and her parents to take her in. They were harbouring a Jewish girl and going to great lengths to do that, giving her their name when they enrolled her in school and in some ways actually putting her in plain sight.
“And the sacrifice of the principal of the school she went to who knew who she was and chose to protect her while she was in the school grounds…They were prepared to sacrifice their own safety to ensure that that young girl was protected. So sacrifice is the underlying theme, and, of course, the whole love of family but also the love of family that you take on and love of country. These people were fighting to get their country back.”
"I think it poses a lot of questions that any individual can give to themselves and see how they can answer,” she adds. “You ask yourself the question, would I have done what that mother did? Would I have done what Andrée and her parents did?”
Crafting the book afforded Heather the opportunity to write, once again, about the remarkable tales of ordinary people, overlooked histories of courage, resilience and hope that continue to resonate today. It all began for her back in 2003, when she was introduced to Lale Sokolov, whose story formed the basis of her 2018 debut The Tattooist of Auschwitz.
Though Heather had been interested in storytelling, she wasn’t, by her own account, a writer, and had worked for over two decades in the social work department at an Australian teaching and research hospital. Lale, however, had hoped his story could be captured in the written word, inspiring Heather to embark on professional scriptwriting courses.
She wrote The Tattooist of Auschwitz as a screenplay for film initially, but after years of “getting nowhere”, she tried her hand at a book, where she found success. Then came the full-circle moment when it was adapted for screen two years ago, scored by Hans and Kara. It was bittersweet however, for Lale did not live to see it.
“But I love that I get these stories come to me and I get a chance to be able to tell them,” reflects Heather, whose books have now sold over 19 million copies worldwide. “This is recent history and the whole thing of history not being remembered is very important to me...These are stories about ordinary men and women and I find those way more powerful because they didn't have an army behind them. They were doing all this on their own with just the support of a very tight network.”
- The Piano Teacher of Montparnasse is out October 22, published by Firefinch. Heather Morris is at Raworths Harrogate Literature Festival on October 22, at The Crown Hotel. In addition to the conversation, live piano performances will weave through the event, bringing the music, atmosphere and emotion of Heather’s new novel to life. For tickets, visit harrogateinternationalfestivals.com