Yom Hashoah: Remembering the Holocaust

On this day of mourning and reflection discover these extremely important books as a way to remember and honor the millions of Jewish lives senselessly lost during the Holocaust.

This vivid and harrowing narrative history of the most notorious concentration camp of the Holocaust preserves the authentic voices of survivors and perpetrators

The largest mass murder in human history took place in World War II at Auschwitz. Yet its story is not fully known. In Auschwitz, Laurence Rees reveals new insights from more than 100 original interviews with survivors and Nazi perpetrators who speak on the record for the first time. Their testimonies provide a portrait of the inner workings of the camp in unrivalled detail-from the techniques of mass murder, to the politics and gossip mill that turned between guards and prisoners, to the on-camp brothel in which the lines between those guards and prisoners became surprisingly blurred.

Rees examines the strategic decisions that led the Hitler and Himmler to make Auschwitz the primary site for the extinction of Europe's Jews-their "Final Solution." He concludes that many of the horrors that were perpetrated in Auschwitz were the result of a terrible immoral pragmatism. The story of the camp becomes a morality tale, too, in which evil is shown to proceed in a series of deft, almost noiseless incremental steps until it produces the overwhelming horror of the industrial scale slaughter that was inflicted in the gas chambers of Auschwitz.

In Our Hearts We Were Giants

by Yehuda Koren

by Eilat Negev

In this remarkable, never-before-told account of the Ovitz family, seven of whose ten members were dwarves, readers bear witness to the best and worst of humanity and to the terrible irony of the Ovitz's fate: being burdened with dwarfism helped them endure the Holocaust. Israeli authors Yehuda Koren and Eilat Negev weave the tale of a beloved and successful family of performers who were famous entertainers in Central Europe until the Nazis deported them to Auschwitz in May 1944. Descending into the hell of the concentration camp from the transport train, the Ovitz family—known widely as the Lilliput Troupe—was separated from other Jewish victims. Dr. Josef Mengele was notified of their arrival and they were assigned better quarters and provided more nutritious food than other inmates. The authors chronicle Mengele's experiments upon the Ovitz's, and the creepy fondness he developed for these small people, even the songs he composed and sang to this family of singers, dancers, and klezmorim. Finally liberated by Russian troops, the family returned to their deserted village in Transylvania, and eventually found their way to a new home in Israel. They resumed their careers, overcame their handicaps and became wealthy and successful performers.

Shtetl

by Eva Hoffman

In Shtetl (Yiddish for "small town"), critically-acclaimed author Eva Hoffman brings the lost world of Eastern European Jews back to vivid life, depicting its complex institutions and vibrant culture, its beliefs, social distinctions, and customs. Through the small town of Brafsk, she looks at the fascinating experiments in multicultural coexistence -- still relevant to us today -- attempted in the eight centuries of Polish-Jewish history, and describes the forces which influenced Christian villagers' decisions to conceal or betray their Jewish neighbors in the dark period of the Holocaust.

From Broken Glass

by Steve Ross

With Glenn Frank

With Brian Wallace

Foreword by Ray Flynn

From the survivor of ten Nazi concentration camps who went on to create the New England Holocaust Memorial, a "devastating...inspirational" memoir (The Today Show) about finding strength in the face of despair.

On August 14, 2017, two days after a white-supremacist activist rammed his car into a group of anti-Fascist protestors, killing one and injuring nineteen, the New England Holocaust Memorial was vandalized for the second time in as many months. At the base of one of its fifty-four-foot glass towers lay a pile of shards. For Steve Ross, the image called to mind Kristallnacht, the Night of Broken Glass in which German authorities ransacked Jewish-owned buildings with sledgehammers.

Ross was eight years old when the Nazis invaded his Polish village, forcing his family to flee. He spent his next six years in a day-to-day struggle to survive the notorious camps in which he was imprisoned, Auschwitz-Birkenau and Dachau among them. When he was finally liberated, he no longer knew how old he was, he was literally starving to death, and everyone in his family except for his brother had been killed.

Ross learned in his darkest experiences--by observing and enduring inconceivable cruelty as well as by receiving compassion from caring fellow prisoners--the human capacity to rise above even the bleakest circumstances. He decided to devote himself to underprivileged youth, aiming to ensure that despite the obstacles in their lives they would never experience suffering like he had. Over the course of a nearly forty-year career as a psychologist working in the Boston city schools, that was exactly what he did. At the end of his career, he spearheaded the creation of the New England Holocaust Memorial, a site millions of people including young students visit every year.

Equal parts heartrending, brutal, and inspiring, From Broken Glass is the story of how one man survived the unimaginable and helped lead a new generation to forge a more compassionate world.

The Nazi Titanic

by Robert P. Watson

Built in 1927, the German ocean liner SS Cap Arcona was the greatest ship since the RMS Titanic and one of the most celebrated luxury liners in the world. When the Nazis seized control in Germany, she was stripped down for use as a floating barracks and troop transport. Later, during the war, Hitler's minister, Joseph Goebbels, cast her as the "star" in his epic propaganda film about the sinking of the legendary Titanic.

Following the film's enormous failure, the German navy used the Cap Arcona to transport German soldiers and civilians across the Baltic, away from the Red Army's advance. In the Third Reich's final days, the ill-fated ship was packed with thousands of concentration camp prisoners. Without adequate water, food, or sanitary facilities, the prisoners suffered as they waited for the end of the war. Just days before Germany surrendered, the Cap Arcona was mistakenly bombed by the British Royal Air Force, and nearly all of the prisoners were killed in the last major tragedy of the Holocaust and one of history's worst maritime disasters.

Although the British government sealed many documents pertaining to the ship's sinking, Robert P. Watson has unearthed forgotten records, conducted many interviews, and used over 100 sources, including diaries and oral histories, to expose this story. As a result, The Nazi Titanic is a riveting and astonishing account of an enigmatic ship that played a devastating role in World War II and the Holocaust.

Alex's Wake

by Martin Goldsmith

Alex's Wake is a tale of two parallel journeys undertaken seven decades apart. In the spring of 1939, Alex and Helmut Goldschmidt were two of more than 900 Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi Germany aboard the St. Louis, “the saddest ship afloat” (New York Times). Turned away from Cuba, the United States, and Canada, the St. Louis returned to Europe, a stark symbol of the world's indifference to the gathering Holocaust. The Goldschmidts disembarked in France, where they spent the next three years in six different camps before being shipped to their deaths in Auschwitz.

In the spring of 2011, Alex's grandson, Martin Goldsmith, followed in his relatives' footsteps on a six-week journey of remembrance and hope, an irrational quest to reverse their fate and bring himself peace. Alex's Wake movingly recounts the detailed histories of the two journeys, the witnesses Martin encounters for whom the events of the past are a vivid part of a living present, and an intimate, honest attempt to overcome a tormented family legacy.

War and Remembrance

by Herman Wouk

A masterpiece of historical fiction and "a journey of extraordinary riches" (New York Times Book Review), War and Remembrance stands as perhaps the great novel of America's "Greatest Generation."

These two classic works capture the tide of world events even as they unfold the compelling tale of a single American family drawn into the very center of the war's maelstrom.

The multimillion-copy bestsellers that capture all the drama, romance, heroism, and tragedy of the Second World War -- and that constitute Wouk's crowning achievement -- are available for the first time in trade paperback.

The Devil That Never Dies

by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen

A groundbreaking -- and terrifying -- examination of the widespread resurgence of antisemitism in the 21st century, by the prize-winning and #1 internationally bestselling author of Hitler's Willing Executioners.

Antisemitism never went away, but since the turn of the century it has multiplied beyond what anyone would have predicted. It is openly spread by intellectuals, politicians and religious leaders in Europe, Asia, the Arab world, America and Africa and supported by hundreds of millions more. Indeed, today antisemitism is stronger than any time since the Holocaust.

In The Devil that Never Dies, Daniel Jonah Goldhagen reveals the unprecedented, global form of this age-old hatred; its strategic use by states; its powerful appeal to individuals and groups; and how technology has fueled the flames that had been smoldering prior to the millennium.

A remarkable work of intellectual brilliance, moral stature, and urgent alarm, The Devil that Never Dies is destined to be one of the most provocative and talked-about books of the year.

Operation Swallow

by Mark Felton

The true and heroic story of American POWs' daring escape from a Nazi concentration camp.

In this little-known story from World War II, a group of American POW camp leaders risk everything to save hundreds of fellow servicemen from a diabolical Nazi concentration camp. Their story begins in the dark forests of the Ardennes during Christmas 1944 and ends at the Buchenwald Concentration Camp in the spring of 1945. This appalling chapter of US military history and uplifting Holocaust story deserves to be widely known and understood.

Operation Swallow provides a historical, first person perspective of how American GIs stood up against their evil SS captors who were forcing them to work as slave laborers. A young GI is thrust into a leadership position and leads his fellow servicemen on a daring escape. It is a story filled with courage, sacrifice, torture, despair, and salvation. A compelling narrative-driven nonfiction book has not been written that takes the reader deep into the dark story of Operation 'Swallow' and Berga Concentration Camp--until now.

Written from personal testimonies and official documents, Operation Swallow is a tale replete with high adventure, compelling characters, human drama, tragedy, and eventual salvation, from the pen of a master of the modern military narrative.

Underground in Berlin

by Marie Jalowicz Simon

Translated by Anthea Bell

Afterword by Hermann Simon

Foreword by Hermann Simon

A thrilling piece of undiscovered history, this is the true account of a young Jewish woman who survived World War II in Berlin.

In 1942, Marie Jalowicz, a twenty-year-old Jewish Berliner, made the extraordinary decision to do everything in her power to avoid the concentration camps. She removed her yellow star, took on an assumed identity, and disappeared into the city.

In the years that followed, Marie took shelter wherever it was offered, living with the strangest of bedfellows, from circus performers and committed communists to convinced Nazis. As Marie quickly learned, however, compassion and cruelty are very often two sides of the same coin.

Fifty years later, Marie agreed to tell her story for the first time. Told in her own voice with unflinching honesty, Underground in Berlin is a book like no other, of the surreal, sometimes absurd day-to-day life in wartime Berlin. This might be just one woman's story, but it gives an unparalleled glimpse into what it truly means to be human.

My Brother's Keeper

by Rod Gragg

2017 Christian Book Award Finalist

Thirty captivating profiles of Christians who risked everything to rescue their Jewish neighbors from Nazi terror during the Holocaust.

My Brother's Keeper unfolds powerful stories of Christians from across denominations who gave everything they had to save the Jewish people from the evils of the Holocaust. This unlikely group of believers, later honored by the nation of Israel as "The Righteous Among the Nations," includes ordinary teenage girls, pastors, priests, a German army officer, a former Italian fascist, an international spy, and even a princess.

In one gripping profile after another, these extraordinary historical accounts offer stories of steadfast believers who together helped thousands of Jewish individuals and families to safety. Many of these everyday heroes perished alongside the very people they were trying to protect. There is no doubt that all of their stories showcase the best of humanity -- even in the face of unthinkable evil.