Jan Eliasberg

Jan Eliasberg

Jan Eliasberg (Jan Pringle Eliasberg) was born on January 6th, 1954 and is currently 72 years old. Jan Eliasberg was born in New York City, NY, USA. Eliasberg attended Wesleyan University where she received a Bachelor of Arts degree and Yale University where she received a Master of Fine Arts degree in Fiction.

Jan Eliasberg is an American director and writer for film, theatre, and television. Her first novel, Hannah’s War has sold more than 70,000 copies.

Hannah’s War has been described as a powerful story of love, war, espionage, and deception. Kate Quinn, author of The Alice Network and The Rose Code, praised it as hard to put down. The Jewish Book Council noted that the novel combines themes of physics, espionage, and Jewish history while also telling a deeply emotional and redemptive story of love.

The book was a finalist for the National Jewish Book Award and has been acquired for a film adaptation, with Eliasberg writing the screenplay and set to direct.

Hannah’s War by Jan Eliasberg is a historical novel inspired by the life of Austrian physicist Lise Meitner, whose discovery of nuclear fission paved the way for nuclear energy and weapons. While some parts of the story are based on real events, much of it is fictionalized to explore themes of science, war, and identity.

The novel follows Hannah Weiss, a brilliant physicist in pre-World War II Germany. As both a woman and a Jew, she faces discrimination and exclusion in the academic world. Forced to leave Europe, she later joins the Manhattan Project in Los Alamos, where Robert Oppenheimer supervises her work. Soon after, suspicions arise that Hannah may be leaking secrets to Nazi Germany. When coded postcards she sent to a colleague are discovered, Major Jack Delaney is ordered to interrogate her.

Over three days, Delaney learns that Hannah is not just a gifted scientist but also a complex and vulnerable woman living in a male-dominated field. Their conversations blur the line between suspicion, attraction and create tension that drives much of the novel. Although Delaney begins to doubt her guilt, the truth about Hannah’s loyalties is revealed in ways readers may not expect.

Beyond the thriller elements, the book raises deeper moral questions about antisemitism, loyalty, and the role of scientists in wartime. It also highlights the historical injustice faced by Lise Meitner, who in reality refused to work on the Manhattan Project and strongly opposed the use of nuclear weapons. While Otto Hahn alone received the 1944 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for nuclear fission, Meitner’s contributions were overlooked, a decision widely criticized ever since.

Blending espionage, romance, and history, Hannah’s War offers both a suspenseful narrative and a reflection on forgotten voices in science. It sheds light on the struggles of women in physics, the prejudice faced by Jews during the war, and the ethical dilemmas behind the creation of the atomic bomb.

Related Authors

Fans of Jan Eliasberg also enjoy these authors:

1. Stephen King, author of The Dark Tower Series.
2. Diana Gabaldon, author of the Outlander Series.
3. James Patterson, author of the Alex Cross Series.
4. John Green, author of: The Fault in Our Stars.
5. Margaret Atwood, author of The Handmaid's Tale Series.

Jan Eliasberg: F.A.Q