Category: Europe

June 22, 2010

The World to Come by Dara Horn *** (of 4)

On the plus side I learned a lot about Chagall. Dara Horn writes well. She channels the great Yiddish authors like Peretsky, Singer, Sholom Aleichem,...

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June 22, 2010

A Thread of Grace by Mary Doria Russell ** (of 4)

It chronicles the Italian resistance to the Germans during the last two years of WWII. A very positive review in Publisher’s Weekly, and it was...

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June 22, 2010

QBVII by Leon Uris

About a trial of a libelous author who writes about Nazis, autobiographical. Uris is a class-act story teller making big books go by quickly.

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June 22, 2010

People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks **** (of 4)

An extensively researched fictional account of the survival of the Sarajevo Haggadah, the luminescently illustrated (that alone is unusual for a Jewish book) account of...

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June 22, 2010

Outwitting History by Aaron Lansky *** (of 4)

As a Hampshire College student in the late 70s, Lansky decides to learn Yiddish. At that time Yiddish, having barely survived the murderous rampage of...

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June 22, 2010

Nuremberg: The Reckoning, by William F. Buckley ** (of 4)

It was surprisingly bad. I learned a fair amount about the Nuremberg trials after WWII, but was shocked by how trivial the plot was and...

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June 22, 2010

Mila 18 by Leon Uris **** (of 4)

One of my absolute favorite books about the Warsaw ghetto uprising. A real page turner with wonderful characterizations.

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June 21, 2010

The Lost: A search for six of six million, by Daniel Mendelsohn **** (of 4)

Nearly sixty years after the author’s great-uncle, wife, and four daughters disappeared in the Holocaust, the author searches for their memories. Beginning with his grandfather’s...

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June 21, 2010

Kristallnacht: Prelude to Destruction by Martin Gilbert *** (of 4)

A fluky book by on the of the world’s greatest Holocaust historians. Gilbert gathers dozens of newly uncovered personal histories of November 10, 1938 when...

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June 21, 2010