Crossing The Line
James D. Shipman
Kensington Books
December 2025
Crossing The Line by James D. Shipman is an insightful story about the struggles of three women during the Holocaust in the Krakow Jewish Ghetto. The storyline shows how the characters faced betrayals, restrictions, and making impossible choices.
The three main characters are Natalia, a young Jewish woman from a wealthy family who believed money could get anything including safety; Irena is a Polish pharmacy worker whose boss runs a pharmacy in the ghetto; and Elsa, a German young woman who becomes an SS officer assigned to the ghetto. While the novel centers on the pharmacy, it also shows the worsening in the ghettoes as the Germans decide to deport the Jews for annihilation. The pharmacy, its owner and employees are real people who risked their lives to remain in the ghetto and help Jews while the characters Natalia and Elsa are fictional.
Once deported to the ghetto Natalia’s world falls apart. She finds some solace working in the pharmacy using her medical training.
Elsa, a young German woman, is recruited by the SS to avoid jail after a deep betrayal. After being assigned to the ghetto she is confronted with the cruelty and violence of her commanders. As restrictions and penalties grow worse each day, Irena, Natalia, and Elsa are drawn toward unexpected alliances and decisions that could save or jeopardize not just their own lives, but the lives of countless others.
Irena as a Pole, who was not Jewish, was allowed to cross the ghetto walls, using this opportunity tosmuggle in food, letters, and essential supplies, and tocarry out information and photographs documenting the atrocities.
The different perspectives in the story provides readers with insight into not just the pharmacy but the Krakov Ghetto.
Elise Cooper: Idea for the story?
James D. Shipman: My previous book, Beyond the Wire, was about the Auschwitz insurrection of prisoners. While in Krakow I was touring Auschwitz and the Jewish Ghetto. Part of the tour talked about this pharmacy. Ultimately, I decided to write about it making sure to have the timelines accurate.
EC: What is true and what is fiction?
JS: All the three female assistants in the pharmacy are real people along with Tadeusz Pankiewicz. They were all Polish, living outside the ghetto, yet had the pharmacy inside the ghetto. He was encouraged by the Nazis to move out of the ghetto, but he refused. They worked with the Polish underground, smuggling in food and medicine. With the help of the Jewish Resistance inside the ghetto they hid people, utilizing hair dye and sleeping pills.
EC: Why the hair dye and sleeping pills?
JS: The Germans made selections of workers to take them to concentration camps. Because they selected older Jews, hair dye was used to make people look younger. The sleeping pills were used to make young children drowsy so they would not cry and reveal the location to the Nazis. This was all true.
EC: Were the main characters real?
JS: Two of the main female characters are fictional, The Jewish woman, Natalia Wajeblum and the German woman, Elsa Baumann. I tend not to use real people when I explore their character arc and motivations.
EC: Why did you explore Jewish denial?
JS: I wanted to show how non-observant Jews assimilated. They were egotistical snobs. A lot of the upper class Polish Jewish families often tended to speak Polish and German. They did not practice the Jewish holidays. In the book they did not have a Jewish identity and these Jews thought they were better than everybody. I wanted to show how the Germans did not care if they did not practice their religion and took them to the Ghetto anyway.
EC: How would you describe Natalia?
JS: Ultimately Natalia realized she was just one more person in this Jewish community that is no better than anybody else and was not going to get special treatment. She was depicted as a feminist, strong-willed, humiliated, helpless as far as street smarts, and snobbish out of ignorance. She was ambitious and selfish.
EC: How would you describe Elsa?
JS: She looked for some kind of purpose and was a conflicted character. She was at the bottom but gained more power in a bad way. I think she and Natalia found redemption at the end of the day. Elsa was a SS guard that represented those from the lower classes or lower middle class that had a rough time in the pre-war years. A lot of them got in trouble by disobeying orders or were criminals. For most of them this was a second chance.
EC: What about the pharmacists?
JS: Tadeusz Pankiewicz was the pharmacist who employed three assistants, Irena Drozdzikowska, Helena Krywaniuk, and Aurelia Danek. They were trying to do good and had to overcome their doubts early on if they were doing the right thing. All of them debated if they should leave when told to go. They had a responsibility to Polish and Jewish customers. Yet they decided to stay because they knew they would be the only ones who could provide medicine, supplies, food, and a hiding place for Jews. They were exceptionally brave people. The pharmacy became the place for Jews to meet, plan underground activities, consider acts of defiance, and provide lifesaving care and equipment. Irena Drozdzikowska smuggled in many medicines and food through the front gate; many times, being searched by the Germans.
EC: Why don’t you think more Poles tried to help the Jews?
JS: They had to grapple with knowing if they did not help the Jews they would survive the war. This was common among the Polish people who strove to not get arrested by the Germans or killed by them or imprisoned by them. They wanted to fall under the radar.
EC: Next book?
JS: I am taking a little break right now.
THANK YOU!!
