‘There is no doubt that [Quartered Safe Out Here] is one of the great personal memoirs of the Second World War’ John KeeganLife and death in Nine Section, a small group of hard-bitten and (to modern eyes) possibly eccentric Cumbrian borderers with whom the author, then nineteen, served in the last great land campaign of World War II, when the 17th Black Cat Division captured a vital strongpoint deep in Japanese territory, held it against counter-attack and spearheaded the final assault in which the Japanese armies were, to quote General Slim, “torn apart”. Read more

He has endured more than any child ever should, but now he must survive Block 66.January, 1945. 14-year-old Moshe Kessler steps off the train at Buchenwald concentration camp. Having endured the horrors of Auschwitz-Birkenau, lost touch with his entire family, and survived the death march in the freezing European winter, he has seen more than his share of tragedy.Moshe knows only one thing about Buchenwald. Everyone knows it.If you want to survive, you have to get to Block 66.The Germans are cruel and determined – but they are not prepared for Buchenwald’s secret resistance, which rises up with one mission only: to protect the camp’s children from harm.This is the incredible true story of Moshe Kessler and Block 66 – the children’s block that was at the forefront of one of the most shocking and inspiring stories of Holocaust survival. Read more

"In spite of everything, I still believe that people are really good at heart."The diary of a young girl is Anne Frank's personal diary, a Jewish teenager who hid with her family in Amsterdam during World War II to avoid Nazi harassment. From 1942 to 1944, Anne represented her thoughts, feelings and daily life in a secret attachment, wrote about her relationships, apprehensions, hopes and dreams. Despite the difficulties of imprisonment, his diary reflects his intelligence, optimism and deep longing for freedom. Sadly, Anne and her family were discovered and sent to concentration camps, where he died in 1945. After the war, his father, Otto Frank, the only survivor, published his diary, which has been the most powerful and widely read. The accounts of Holocost are a symbol of the flexibility of the human soul. Read more

Love Blossoms, Secrets Unravel, and Lives Hang in the Balance...Amid the chaos and uncertainty of World War II, a remarkable romance unfolds. Meet a courageous young combat medic, Staff Sergeant Edmund Kruszynski, whose dedication to saving lives takes him to the front lines of battle. Through D-Day, the Battle of the Bulge, and bearing witness to the horrors of the Holocaust, Ed survives saving lives even while seeing close friends perish. He returns home adorned with medals, yet the battle still rages within.Follow the journey of the medic’s wife Mary, whose strength and devotion gets tested as their seemingly unbreakable bond teeters on the edge. Will Mary’s vow to protect her husband’s secrets hold firm, or will the weight of what happened cause their world to unravel? Some vows…are destined to be broken.Historical Fiction told through real-life testimonies, first-person accounts, interviews and photographs. Read more

The Woven Ones is a powerful, true story that chronicles the lives of a woman, her daughter, and the American soldier who changed both their destinies through a serendipitous moment in the crucible of World War II. Based on firsthand accounts and meticulous research, this remarkable narrative weaves together history, survival, and the search for the truth. Read more

He will stay in Auschwitz to the bitter end if it means his brother might survive.Poland, 1940. Moshe and his family flee their hometown of Warsaw in a desperate bid for survival as Nazi forces advance on the city. Hiding under false identities, they hope to wait out the end of the war, which must surely be near.But nowhere is truly safe for Poland’s Jews, and soon Moshe and his brother find themselves en route to Auschwitz, from where no one returns. Separated from the rest of their family, they hold on to each other with everything they have.But a devastating accident leads the brothers to confront an impossible choice – stay together and perish in Auschwitz, or part ways for the smallest chance to survive. As the war draws to a close, Moshe is willing to do whatever it takes to keep his brother safe, even if it means remaining behind, alone, in the one place he is most desperate to leave.In an unbelievable true story, Moshe and his brother face hunger, hatred, and one heartbreaking goodbye in the hopes of living to see the skies beyond the walls of Auschwitz once more.Previously published as Anything But His Soul. Read more

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The moving story of Professor Shaul Harel’s life from darkness to light, from Holocaust survivor to world expert in pediatric neurology and child development.This is the story of Prof. Shaul Harel, formerly Charlie Hilsberg, who lost his shadow in 1942 at only five years old, when he was separated from his family and surroundings and saved from the furnaces of Auschwitz by the Belgian resistance.This book reveals his story, from his time as a “hidden child” in France and Belgium during the Holocaust, through his experiences in orphanages, his immigration to Israel, the serious injury he sustained in his military service, the choice to study medicine, and lastly the mark he has made in the field of pediatric neurologyand child development in Israel and in the world.A story of overcoming impossible trauma and reaching professional and personal success against all odds. The book channels a universal message of survival, optimism, and hope. Read more

What if everyone you loved was suddenly taken away? Five siblings struggle to stay together as the tides of war threaten to tear them apart.When Germany invades France in the Second World War, the five Laskowski children lose everything: their home, their Jewish community and most devastatingly their parents who are abducted in the night. There is no safe place left for them to evade the Nazis, but they cling together, never certain when the authorities will come for what is left of them.Inspired by the poignant, true story of the author’s mother, this moving historical novel conveys the hardship, the uncertainty and the impossible choices the Laskowski children were forced to make to survive the horrors of the Holocaust. Read more

"Moving, truthful, and wise account of exile from Poland in 1968. ”Olga Tokarczuk. Nobel Prize for Literature"In 1968, the communist regime in Poland unleashed a state-sponsored antisemitic campaign, leaving Jewish families—who were all Holocaust survivors—with no further prospects for life in Poland. Sabina Baral, a 20-year-old student at the time, chronicles her family’s harrowing journey as they were stripped of their citizenship, uprooted from their home, and thrust into an uncertain world. While Poland was fraught with xenophobia and hate, the reception in other countries offered a more welcoming respite.Baral’s deeply personal narrative goes beyond displacement to capture the emotional weight of being labeled "unwanted," the profound challenges of forced emigration, and the unyielding hope for dignity and belonging. From bittersweet goodbyes in Poland to long stopovers in Vienna and Rome, her story reflects the universal struggles of immigrants navigating systemic oppression, cultural dislocation, and prejudice.This is not a Holocaust memoir, but rather a generational memoir that examines the enduring impact of antisemitism over time. Burdened by the trauma of Holocaust survival, Baral sheds light on the scars left by systemic hatred, offering an intimate portrait of the human cost of bigotry and exclusion.Already a celebrated literary success in Poland, with six editions and acclaimed adaptations for theater and television, Notes from Exile transcends its origins to touch hearts worldwide. This English edition invites readers of all backgrounds—Jews and non-Jews alike—to reflect on the resilience of those who have endured exile and to draw timeless lessons from history’s profound narratives.For readers of Jewish history, immigrant narratives, and stories of survival, Notes from Exile is a testament to memory, justice, and the strength of the human spirit. As Nobel laureate Olga Tokarczuk calls it, “A powerful document and great literature.” Read more

A young girl is suddenly all alone and on the run from the Nazis in her hometown in Poland. Having survived an aktion that was intended to completely rid Czestochowa of all the Jews, she and her father try to make their way back to their home during the late hours of the night.Confronted by a policeman, Halina Goldberg unexplainably runs away from her father and begins her long journey of survival. When tired of fleeing, she volunteers to go into a work camp. That decision buys her some time because the Germans need labor for the war effort. Halina works in three different camps from the Fall of 1943 to January 1945. At first, the camps are bearable, even though the prioners are worked hard and fed very little. But as the Germans begin to lose the war, the conditions turn deathly. The Jews become overrun with disease and their captors grow crueler and crueler.As it becomes clear that the war is lost, the SS empty the camps and set over 2,000 women on a four-month long march that would cover over 800 kilometers during one of Europe’s coldest winters on record. Halina was one of the only 300 who survived the Volary Death March and finally felt the need to record her hellish story of survival. Read more

Mukacevo, Czechoslovakia. Two young girls, Manci and Ruth Grunberger, are growing up in a loving Jewish family with their six siblings at the base of Carpathian Mountains, a peaceful region until Hungary annexes the territory in 1938.As WWII engulfs Europe, the area gradually becomes the focus of the Nazi’s Final Solution. The Grunberger family is sent to Auschwitz where Josef Mengele chooses who lives and who dies. Their father, mother, and six siblings are murdered in the gas chambers.The two sisters survive seven months in Auschwitz and another five months marching through the Sudeten Mountains at the mercy of brutal SS guards before being rescued near the Danish border. The sisters are found by family in Philadelphia and become some of the first Jewish refugees brought to the United States.From these traumatic beginnings, what emerges are two fulfilling life stories. The sisters have different beliefs, interests, and coping methods, and yet, their personal bond—the selfless, unconditional love between them—only grows stronger throughout the years.Captured in two first-person memoirs—and presented along with added historical references—this is a remarkable story of resilience and survival that describes a resounding triumph of the human spirit spanning nine decades. Read more

In 1945 Joe walked out of a Nazi concentration camp. His story has never been told — until now.Shortly before dawn on a frigid morning in Radom, Poland, German soldiers forced twenty-one year-old Icek "Joe" Rubinsztejn onto a crowded, open-air truck. The next day, several around him were dead. From there, things got worse for young Joe-much worse. Joe arrived at Auschwitz on April 30, 1942. Now, in his nineties, Joe reveals how he survived several of the most notorious concentration camps when so many others perished. His is a remarkable narrative-a unique story of endurance, courage and faith.Barefooted when he was seized by the Nazis, Joe became one of New York's leading shoe designers-working with companies whose shoes were sought after by First Ladies and movie stars alike. Joe's story bears witness to the ultimate triumph of the human spirit. While the Nazis took everything else, they were unable to take his unassailable joy.Joe's story is one of discovering light in the darkest of places, an inspiration for us all. Read more

A unique approach to Holocaust literature, I Will Give Them an Everlasting Name comprises the compelling stories of nine Jews connected by the Holocaust and Jacksonville, Florida. They experienced the atrocities of the Holocaust in 1930s and 40s Europe, surviving multiple concentration and death camps such as Auschwitz-Birkenau, Dachau, and Bergen-Belsen. One escaped from a Soviet gulag, another hid in a hole in the ground for months, and another was in charge of executing Nazi criminals after WWII in Landsberg prison. The tenth story is about a courageous Gentile who saved many Jewish lives, risking his own.While each has his or her own unique, painful, and compelling story of survival, they all landed in a single city in the United States after the war: Jacksonville, Florida. These stories, however heart-wrenching they might be, demonstrate the triumph of the human spirit and, ultimately, the joys of lives well lived in their new home in the United States. Read more

Alexander Rosenberg was a smart and curious teenager who spoke many languages, collected stamps, played the violin, and lived a pampered life with his affluent parents in a tranquil Czechoslovakian town. The rise of fascism and Nazi Germany causes his protected existence to collapse, alongside the illusion of secular Jewish assimilation in 1930s Europe.Using their last reserves of wealth and influence to escape extermination, the Rosenbergs go underground to avoid the Gestapo. Eventually exposed, captured, and taken to Buchenwald, the largest concentration camp in Germany, Alexander and his father collaborate to survive one day at a time. A chaotic chain of events puts young Alexander at the heart of a massive armament sabotage scheme. When his father is gravely injured and disappears after an air bombing, it is up to industrious Alexander to create leverage and use wartime machinations and raw talent to save his father's life.This universal, true story of inner strength, resourcefulness and optimism was documented and written by Alexander's grandson, Oren Schneider. It is dedicated to brave people everywhere who choose not to give up. Read more

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While imprisoned in Auschwitz-Birkenau and Ravensbrück, thirteen-year-old Ruth Krautwirth maintains a sense of dignity even as she struggles to stay alive. As a grandmother, Ruth realizes she must tell her story. Her words, captured in letters to her granddaughter, convey her life story. It begins with the rise of antisemitism in Nazi Germany during her youth. Then, with vivid imagery and heartbreaking detail, Ruth describes the unfathomable experiences of two years in concentration camps with her mother. In her search for meaning and understanding after the war, Ruth emphasizes the importance of remembrance. Her testimony serves as a warning to prevent the recurrence of genocide. Read more

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A cache of poignant lettersA narrow escape from Nazi-occupied EuropeA family scattered and forever changed by warIn 1940, thousands of Jewish refugees descended upon sunny Lisbon, desperately scrambling to acquire visas to escape Nazi-occupied Europe. Among them were Elsa and Saly Levi, a young German-Jewish couple who thought they had found safety in neutral Belgium—until Nazi bombs began to fall. Their eyes were fixed on America, but anywhere would do, as long they were far from the Nazis’ reach. But there were others to consider: Saly’s parents were trapped in Vichy France, and Elsa’s mother in Berlin.In the Wake of Madness captures heartache and hope as history unfolds, from the prewar period in Germany to 1950 New York. Armed with a wealth of long-neglected personal documents, the author pieces together the nail-biting details of her family’s escape. Her journey takes the reader to Germany, Belgium, Portugal, New York, Japan, Chile, Britain and Palestine as WWII scattered loved ones across the globe.A powerful true story that is both intimate and universal. Read more

In a world in which antisemitism is on the rise, Horvath’s story—equal parts disturbing and inspiring—is necessary and timely reading. A poetic, nuanced tribute to the power of music and family. — Kirkus Reviews, starred review.One of the 100 Best Indie Books of 2023Ms Horvath's ability of unrestrained self-reflection combined with her eloquent writing style, her way of summarizing complex events into comprehensible paragraphs will not let you put the book down. — Jewish Book World Janet Horvath tells [her parents'] gripping story with honesty and humour in an engaging style as if talking to a friend. —THE STRAD music magazineA sweeping history of three generations darkened by the long shadow of the Holocaust, The Cello Still Sings is a vivid, moving, and true story of personal discovery. As a child Janet is haunted by the eerie hush surrounding her parents' experiences. George and Katherine, two professional musicians and Holocaust survivors, bury the memories of who and what they were before, silencing the past in order to live. Music is their lifeline.After five decades of secrets, Janet finally unravels her Holocaust heritage when she stumbles upon a clue. After the war, George performed morale-boosting programs throughout Bavaria in a twenty-member orchestra of concentration camp survivors. Although Janet also becomes a cellist, her father never discloses that two of the programs, in 1948, were led by the legendary American maestro, Leonard Bernstein.Janet's father was more fortunate than others. When he was rounded up for hard labor, narrowly missing deportation to the death camps of Auschwitz, a music-loving Nazi guard gave him gloves to protect his cello-playing hands. Janet's memoir of the Holocaust is deeply personal and illuminating. Through humor and colorful story-telling, she weaves her parents' life into her own and captures the intensity of their life experiences. The lingering scars are healed through the sustenance and power of music, and their music-making unites people from generation to generation. Read more