Tag: world history

fiction

Book Review: House on Endless Waters by Emuna Elon

Stephanie1 Comment

I don’t read a lot of literary fiction. I learned fairly early on in my adult life that I don’t necessarily connect with the characters well, and in general, the genre is a little too slow-paced for my tastes. But someone from a Jewish books group on Facebook recommended House on Endless Waters by Emuna Elon (Atria Books, 2020), and it sounded fascinating. I’ve also had good experiences with some Jewish literary fiction, so I decided to give this one a try – and it fit a category for the 2023 Popsugar Reading Challenge of a historical fiction book. Double win!

On a reluctant visit to his birthplace of Amsterdam, Israeli author Yoel Blum discovers familiar faces in a video at the local Jewish museum: his mother, his sister, and…a baby who isn’t him. A return trip to Amsterdam, this time without his wife but with a plan to stay much longer, sets him on the path to figuring out the mystery of that video so he can both understand and also base his next novel on it.

The story of Yoel’s past unfolds slowly, the story running parallel to his own, occasionally in the same paragraph (which sounds like it would be confusing, but it’s really not. It works well, in a way I found surprising for me, since literary fiction usually isn’t my jam). The struggle of his parents to adapt to the quickly changing situation in both Europe as a whole and Amsterdam, where everything was supposed to be safe; the increasing dangers; the food shortages; the disappearance of his father; the arguments with friends and neighbors; the disappearances of so many people around them, all terrifying and horrible. Yoel’s knowledge increases bit by bit as he gets to know the city of his birth, and he develops a new understanding of not only his childhood, but his relationship with his mother, his wife, and even his grandchildren as the truth of his path unfolds. 

This worked really, really well for me. It’s not entirely clear as to what parts of the 1940’s-narrative are fiction and what are based on what Yoel is learning about his past, but the story comes together almost seamlessly, blending expertly with Yoel’s present fact-finding discovery trip. It’s tense, to be sure, and there’s a mystery that isn’t too difficult to figure out, but it’s emotional and devastating all the same. Yoel’s growth as a writer, a husband, a parent, and grandparent is gentle over the course of the novel, culminating in some tender scenes at the end of the book, leaving me wishing I could stick around and see more of not only how his life changes upon his return to Israel, but how this new book of his is received by his fans.

I’m really glad I took the chance on this book. I’ve gotten such great suggestions from my Jewish book group, and this was no exception. 

Follow Emuna Elon on Twitter here.

memoir · nonfiction

Book Review: Eva and Eve: A Search for My Mother’s Lost Childhood and What a War Left Behind by Julie Metz

Stephanie2 Comments

The Holocaust is such a complicated subject, and it’s no wonder that so many children of survivors go on to write their own memoirs, because that kind of trauma is something that’s passed on, that reaches forward through the generations. I’ve read quite a few of these memoirs so far, and I’m sure I’ll read more, but my feeling of responsibility to read them all is how Eva and Eve: A Search for My Mother’s Lost Childhood and What a War Left Behind by Julie Metz (Atria Books, 2021) ended up on my TBR. 

Julie Metz’s mother, Eve, rarely talked about her childhood experiences in Vienna during World War II, and Julie never felt as though she could ask. When her mother died, discoveries among her possessions led Julie to begin searching for the past her mother kept buried away, and this search would take her across countries and continents.

From Vienna to Italy, emailing, calling, and video chatting with people across the US, Europe, and Israel, Ms. Metz began piecing together the story of her mother’s life: daughter of a successful businessman whose survival came thanks to the necessity of the products his factory created and coincidentally, due to his love of hiking; sister to two brothers sent away to England early on, before things got too complicated in Vienna. She tracks the changes that came to Vienna and to her mother’s family and friends, the struggles they had in day-to-day life, the difficulties surviving (and despite those difficulties, how they were shielded from the worst of the suffering), and their escape to America via a trip through Italy, and the ship that brought them across the ocean.

Ms. Metz’s search is one of obvious dedication, and I’m sure it was emotional to visit all the places her mother lived and that were stolen from her and her family. I did feel like from time to time, the book dragged a little, but the overarching goal of the author and the tense journey of her family members out of war-torn Europe kept me turning pages. It’s a story that illustrates that even survival leaves scars and pain that echo through the generations. 

Visit Julie Metz’s website here.

nonfiction

Book Review: Stolen Words: The Nazi Plunder of Jewish Books by Mark Glickman

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I can’t actually remember how Stolen Words: The Nazi Plunder of Jewish Books by Mark Glickman (The Jewish Publication Society, 2015) ended up on my TBR; likely a mention by one of the many Jewish pages I follow on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. Books and reading have always been an important part of being Jewish (we are the People of the Book!), and so learning about and understanding what happened to Jewish books during and after World War II was something that piqued my interest. Boy, did I learn a LOT from this book!

So, almost everyone knows that the Nazi burned books. Most of us have seen pictures of people throwing books onto a huge bonfire, and we use Nazi book burning as a metaphor for the dangers of censorship. But most of us probably don’t know that their book burning phase didn’t last very long; they quickly moved on to collecting books. That’s right. The Nazis stole, then collected Jewish writings even as they mowed down the Jewish people during World War II. They planned to study the writings of the culture they had wiped out. Fortunately, they lost, and afterwards, one of the many questions to be answered at war’s end became, “Now what do we do with all these millions of books?”

In order to help the reader understand the importance of this question, Rabbi Mark Glickman begins the book with a fascinating look at the history of Jewish texts and the emphasis on reading and study that has always been central to Judaism. The second section segues into the many heartbreaking ways the Nazis stole and desecrated our texts; the third, how so many people worked for years to return said texts to their rightful owners, or, barring the ability to do that, to send the texts to the places they would again be loved and cherished. This was obviously a massive amount of work; millions upon millions of books and papers had been stolen and hidden away, or stored in places that ranged from caves to castles. Moving these books involved multiple organizations working tirelessly for years.

This is an incredible book that tells a story I hadn’t heard before. I had no idea about the Nazis stealing books; even with all the reading I’ve done about history, World War II, and the Shoah, I had been under the impression that they burned books and nothing else. I had no clue about the massive troves of Jewish literature that lay hidden after the war, nor of the incredible effort of so many people to return these books to communities and organizations that would recognize them for the treasures that they are. This book presented a brand-new understanding of history to me, and I’m grateful to Rabbi Glickman for having penned such an interested, eye-opening work. I always appreciate being able to be better informed about anything, but especially Judaism and Jewish history.

nonfiction

Book Review: Hitler’s Furies: German Women in the Nazi Killing Fields by Wendy Lower

Stephanie3 Comments

My second book lately by Wendy Lower (the first being The Ravine). She’s an amazing researcher and fabulous writer, but her books are heavy, so beware. I added Hitler’s Furies: German Women in the Nazi Killing Fields (Chatto Windus, 2013) as soon as I learned about it, but it took me a bit to get to it, due to life business and waiting to be in the right mental space. It does share a lot in common with James Wyllie’s Nazi Wives, so if you’re looking to learn more about that aspect of World War II and Holocaust history, both these books should be on your reading list.

When we learn about the history of Germany in the 1940’s, the names in the books read like a long parade of men. It’s men who did the killing, who perpetrated all the harm, who were responsible for the mass death and suffering. But is that true? Using well-honed research skills, interviews, and original source documents, Wendy Lower says no. Not only were many, many German women supportive of the mission, especially on the Eastern front, more than a few of them participated in the murders and created suffering and pain for many others.

Many were there to support their husbands; others signed up to be stationed on the eastern front out of a sense of adventure. For whatever reason they came to be part of the Nazi killing machine, plenty of women supported Hitler’s ideals and bought into the antisemitism and hatred that was par for the course at the time. And far be it from learning anything; these attitudes followed many of these women – few of whom were prosecuted for their actions – long after the war ended.

Not an easy read. The women Lower portrays are the furthest from ‘sugar, spice, and all things nice’ as one can possibly be. These women are hateful and murderous, finding the death of human beings funny and entertaining. They delight in the suffering they cause, only to deny and weep when brought to trial. While women were often looked at as weaker and unable to perpetrate such horrors, Ms. Lower shows that this was absolutely not the case. Women were just as disgustingly brutal, and in some cases more so, than the men.

Rough book, but an important one.

memoir

Book Review: The Choice: Embrace the Possible by Dr. Edith Eva Eger

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I feel such a responsibility to read memoirs by Holocaust survivors. So much history, so much suffering, so much to learn about how not just to survive but even thrive while carrying some of the worst trauma imaginable. I’m careful about how and when I read these books, however; I recognize when I’m more able to engage with these types of books, in order to preserve my mental health (especially with the constant chaos going on in the world today), and hopefully you are too. On my last library trip, I decided I was ready for The Choice: Embrace the Possible by Dr. Edith Eva Eger (Scribner, 2017), a Holocaust survivor, and I’m glad I was. This is a remarkable book.

Edith Eger was only sixteen years old when she wound up in Auschwitz. Her parents were killed immediately; her oldest sister had been away playing violin concerts, so she hadn’t made the trip, but Edith and her other sister clung to each other, helping each other to survive and risking their lives for each other. Throughout her time there, through illness, starvation, grief, and pain, Edith managed to maintain an attitude that helped her make it through the grueling days of suffering, and afterwards, trying to rebuild a life without her parents and beloved boyfriend, she carried on with that same attitude, marrying, having a family, and eventually earning a PhD and growing a successful therapy practice. Her story is one of resilience, a message about how we can’t always choose our circumstances, but we can choose our attitude towards them, and some attitudes are more helpful for survival – and thriving! – than others.

Dr. Eger’s story is a tough one. Her descriptions of conditions, of the depravity forced upon the prisoners in Auschwitz and the other camps she spent time in are horrifying, and there were definitely times I had to set the book down and take a few breaths. It’s not an easy story to listen to, but these stories are so, so important. We can’t let this history be lost; we have to take it in, carry it with us into the future, and make sure our children understand what the outcome of such hatred looks like.

Reading about Dr. Eger’s successful practice, not only after having survived the Holocaust but after having earned her PhD as an adult student, filled me with hope (and also more than a little jealousy for her clients; she sounds like she’s a remarkable therapist!). Maybe it’s not too late for me to become something more than what I am now. If she can do it, maybe I can, too…

Truly a heart-wrenching, inspiring book, one I’m very glad made its way to my TBR.

Visit Dr. Edith Eger’s website here.

Follow her on Twitter here.

fiction · graphic novel

Book Review: White Bird by R.J. Palacio

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At some point, I learned about the existence of White Bird by R.J. Palacio (Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2019) and looked for it at the library, but it never seemed to be in, and since I never formally added the book to my TBR, I kind of forgot about it. But my daughter has discovered a love for graphic novels, and on our last trip to the library, I finally found that elusive copy of White Bird. Into my bag it went.

It’s been quite a few years since I read Ms. Palacio’s Wonder, so I didn’t quite remember Julian, Auggie’s bully, but he’s back in White Bird, interviewing his grandmother Sara, who survived the Holocaust thanks to the kindness of a local family. (The story stands alone, so reading Wonder beforehand isn’t necessary.) Julien is the boy who sits next to Sara at school. He’s survived polio and uses crutches, making him a target of many of the other students, but Sara’s never really spoken to him. The day that the Nazis come to take away the Jewish students, Julien helps Sara to hide, then takes her to his home, where her parents stash her in the barn.

As the war rages on, the two children grow, mature, and establish a firm friendship, and Sara comes to understand her prior selfishness and immaturity. But there are few Holocaust stories without loss, and through Sara’s story of survival, her grandson Julian learns what true friendship is, and how we can’t change the past, but we can move on as better people.

A beautifully drawn graphic novel, White Bird would make for a gentle introduction to an emotionally charged subject. The Holocaust and all its devastation and atrocities isn’t easy to introduce to children, but it’s a vital part of history that needs to be taught. Parents, you wouldn’t be remiss in checking this out of the library and just leaving it around the house. Odds are your kids will spot it and dive in. There’s nothing graphic or too overtly scary, but there are mentions of death; I’d put this as okay for mature fourth grade and up. Be prepared to have some discussions with your kids about the book afterwards; they’ll likely have a lot of big feelings when they turn the last page.

This is a fast read, but the story, though fiction, will stay with you. The drawings are simple, allowing Sara and Julien’s story to take center stage, and placing the reader in its various settings: running from the Nazis at school, hiding in a bale of hay in a barn, struggling to keep terror and an overwhelming sense of loss at bay. I’m glad I finally came across a copy on my library’s shelves, and I’m glad that it’s such a popular choice that I did struggle to find it. White Bird shouldn’t be missed. Especially not now that it’s being released in movie format on October 14, 2022.

Visit R.J. Palacio’s website here.

Follow her on Twitter here.

fiction · historical fiction

Book Review: The Kitchen Front by Jennifer Ryan

Stephanie2 Comments

World War II! Rationing! Making do in trying circumstances! From the moment I learned about The Kitchen Front by Jennifer Ryan (Ballantine Books, 2021), I knew I would enjoy it. I’m fascinated by all things rationing (check out a review I did of a book about the subject, Make Do and Mend: Keeping Family and Home Afloat on War Rations, forward by Jill Norman) and have been ever since I was introduced to the subject as a young girl in one of my favorite books in the world, Back Home by Michelle Magorian. The Kitchen Front didn’t disappoint; it was as charming as I suspected it would be.

It’s wartime Britain, and the BBC has introduced a new contest on its show dedicated to helping housewives learn to deal with wartime rationing. The Kitchen Front’s contest is looking for the best rationing chef, and four women are desperate to win. Audrey is a widowed mom to three boys, struggling to stay afloat ever since her husband was killed in the war. Gwen, Audrey’s image-obsessed social climber sister, is hiding her unhappy reality behind an icy-old façade. Nell, an orphan-turned-maid, is scared of her own shadow, but cooking brings out the best in her. And Zelda, a professionally trained Cordon Bleu chef, will do just about anything to win – but will the secret she’s carrying ruin everything for her?

A ruthless beginning eases into something with softer edges as the women are forced together and begin to understand each other’s stories. Rifts will be mended, new bridges forged, and brand-new paths forward will appear amidst the strain and struggle of wartime. The Kitchen Front is full of charm, friendship, and the can-do attitude that gave British women the reputation for strength and fortitude of character that pulled them through the long years of rationing.

What a lovely book. The characters are all with their own personal struggles, but each is so determined to triumph despite them, that you can’t help but root for every single one, even when some of them sink to some truly low levels to win. The research put into this story is evident, with characters foraging for wild-grown ingredients, substituting local ingredients for little-known ones, and utilizing cooking techniques and recipes known to the era. (A few of the lines mentioned in the book, particularly about manner of dress for women at the time, I had learned just days before while watching episodes of Horrible Histories with my daughter!) This was very obviously a labor of love for the author, and it shows in her respectful treatment of all of the characters and how they came together in the end.

If you’ve read other books by Jennifer Ryan, I’d love to hear if you enjoyed them! I don’t read as much fiction as I’d like, and I tend to be kind of picky about the fiction I do read, so if you’ve got recommendations here, I’d love to hear them! Her The Wedding Dress Sewing Circle looks particularly interesting!

Visit Jennifer Ryan’s website here.

Follow her on Twitter here.

graphic nonfiction

Book Review: Brazen: Rebel Ladies Who Rocked the World by Pénélope Bagieu, translated by Montana Kane

Stephanie3 Comments

Yet another example of how I shouldn’t be allowed unfettered access to the library when I already have books at home. But how could I resist? Brazen: Rebel Ladies Who Rocked the World by Pénélope Bagieu (First Second, 2018), translated by Montana Kane, was just sitting there, begging me to take it home, and I was like, “It’s graphic nonfiction! It won’t take me long to read at all! It’ll be fiiiiiiiinnnnne.” And it was. : )

In short chapters, Ms. Bagieu tells the story of a woman from history- sometimes ancient, sometimes modern- who stepped outside of the lines society drew for her and created her own reality. Some you’ve likely heard of- Temple Grandin, Nellie Bly, Betty Davis, Hedy Lamarr- and others likely not- Naziq al-Abid, Frances Glessner Lee, Delia Akeley, Giorgina Reid. Each has a spark of something a little extra that allowed them to stand up against the restrictions society placed against women in their time and that inspired them to be a little more than what the world told them to be. The charming illustrations are perfect for Ms. Bagieu’s slightly snarky sense of storytelling; overall, this is a fabulous book of women’s history.

I learned a lot from this book; even at 41, there’s still so much I don’t know, and I was absolutely fascinated with every story in this book. That’s not to say I loved all the people portrayed; some were a little disturbing (but, as the author says, plenty of men act in similar ways and they’ve gotten away with it for centuries, which was, happily, something I also thought about when I was I reading this particular historical figure’s story. I love when my brain actually thinks intelligent things and not just things like, “Wait, why did I get up and walk into the kitchen again???”), but wow, there were just so many fascinating women portrayed in this book that I had never heard of. I would love to read anything else Pénélope Bagieu has written, because I enjoyed everything about the experience of reading this book.

It’s too late for the 2021 holidays, but this would make a fabulous gift for any young feminist (and that’s male or female!), even if they’re not much of a reader. The graphic nonfiction format makes it a quick read, but the format will also hold the attention of even the most reluctant non-reader, and the humor sprinkled throughout the stories keep the feel light. Pick up a copy for that niece that’s hard to buy for, or your feminist co-worker’s son. They’ll love it.

Visit Pénélope Bagieu’s website here.

Follow her on Twitter here.

graphic memoir · nonfiction

Book Review: When I Grow Up: The Lost Autobiographies of Six Yiddish Teens by Ken Krimstein

Stephanie1 Comment

I should never be trusted in the library alone.

I ran my son over there this week; he had lost his wallet earlier this year and hadn’t yet replaced his library card, plus there was a book he wanted to check out, so we stopped in. “I don’t need anything,” I told him. “Don’t let me look at books. I have two library books to read right now, plus two from NetGalley waiting for me. I don’t need to bring home another book.”

Friends, I brought home another book.

But how could I not??? I’d heard of When I Grow Up: The Lost Autobiographies of Six Yiddish Teens by Ken Krimstein (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2021). I hadn’t added it to my TBR, but it remained lodged in my brain, and as soon as I saw it standing on top of a shelf in the New Books section, I gasped and grabbed it (and then mentally yelled at myself, and then yelled at myself for yelling at myself). And then I checked it out and took it home, being sure to keep my eyes off all the other tempting books before we left the library.

I didn’t realize until I was at home that Mr. Krimstein is the same author of The Three Escapes of Hannah Arendt, which I read and enjoyed right before the beginning of the pandemic (I’m going to assume the stress of that time erased his name from my brain, because I’ve thought of that book often since reading it). Always nice to spend more time with an author I’d previously enjoyed!

Just before Poland was invaded, writing competitions were held for Yiddish-speaking young adults in eastern Europe. Because of the invasion, the winners were never announced, and the manuscripts were hidden away from the book-burning bonfires of the Nazis. They were discovered again in 2017, painting a vivid picture of what life was like for young people standing on the edge of likely destruction.

As the competitions required anonymity, only one of the author’s identities has been discovered (and fortunately, she survived), lending the book a haunting feel when you read with the hindsight and clarity of knowing what was to come for these optimistic teenagers. The illustrations add to this feel, and the overall book is at once tragic and wistful, optimistic and with an overarching sense of doom. It’s a miracle that these writings survived at all; that they’ve been illustrated and published is an amazing testament to our strength and our ongoing fascination with this subject and our determination to not let these voices be silenced.

Because of the nature of this book- it’s graphic nonfiction- it’s a quick read, but the wonder and the unanswered questions will stay with you.

Visit Ken Krimstein’s website here.

Follow him on Twitter here.

nonfiction

Book Review: Last Witnesses: An Oral History of the Children of World War II by Svetlana Alexievich

Stephanie2 Comments

Piggybacking off my last book, I grabbed a copy of Last Witnesses: An Oral History of the Children of World War II by Svetlana Alexievich (Random House, 2019) from the library. I had read Ms. Alexievich’s Voices from Chernobyl in 2019, and while writing my review for that, I checked out her other books, and that’s how this one ended up on my list. Most books about World War II center around European nations: Germany, Poland, England, France. I hadn’t read anything before that focused on the Soviet Union, and definitely not anything from the perspective of the children who survived the horrors. I don’t know that the perspective of Soviet Children was a perspective I ever considered, and there was certainly a lot in this book I hadn’t known about.

Children are uniquely traumatized by war, and World War II was devastating for millions of children, for a million different reasons. The children of the Soviet Union suffered in a multitude of ways, most of them horrific and brutal. Each small chapter in this book is a transcript of an interview with a person who was a child during the war, who witnessed terrible things no human being should ever witness, but who have shared their stories, at great personal cost, so that the world will remember what it took from them.

There is deep, scarring pain on every page of this book. Most children lose their fathers; many of them watch their fathers being murdered, and many of them watch their mothers murdered as well. Some are forced to bury their parents. Others watch as their siblings die or are murdered in front of them. They starve. They’re beaten by soldiers. They witness their neighbors slaughtered by German soldiers. They eat grass and dogs and cats in order to survive. They dig graves and hide in the forests in winter. They flee their houses that the soldiers set on fire. They’re damaged for life from all that they’ve seen and suffered.

How did I make it to 41 years old without knowing all of this? My schooling barely touched on war on the Soviet front. All I remember learning is about how the German army went to the USSR and froze; I was never taught about the nightmare the Germans foisted upon the Soviet people, and definitely not the way they murdered their way through so many of the towns. I learned about how the Nazi soldiers occupied towns in France and Denmark; how they bombed England and how tough rationing was; never once was I taught about how they raped grandmothers and left parents hanging from ropes in trees in the USSR. Did other schools teach this? I had a really good education and I’m usually pretty pleased with all that I learned in the schools I attended, but this was absolutely never covered even once.

Needless to say, this is a dark, dark read from a horrible period of history that I’m actively embarrassed I knew so little about. If you have the mental and emotional space for it, I highly recommend it, because these are stories that need to be heard and understood, and Svetlana Alexievich has compiled an incredible collection of stories that illustrate the deep abyss of pain Nazi soldiers wrought upon Soviet children and their families.