history / holocaust

"We know that there is only one ending to this, only one liberation from this barbed wire hell: death." --Eddy de Wind In 1943, amidst the start of German occupation, Eddy de Wind worked as a doctor at Westerbork, a Dutch transit camp. His mother had been taken to this camp by Nazis but Eddy was assured by the Jewish Council she would be freed in exchange for his labor. He later found out she'd already been transferred to Auschwitz. While at Westerbork, he fell in love with a woman named Friedel and they married. One year later, they were transported to Auschwitz. Upon arrival, Friedel and Eddy were separated--Eddy forced to work as a medical assistant in one barrack, Friedel at the mercy of Nazi experimentation in a nearby block. Sneaking moments with his beloved and communicating whenever they could, Eddy longed for the day he could be free with Friedel... Written in the camp itself in the weeks following the Red Army's liberation of the camp, Last Stop Auschwitz is the raw, true account of Eddy's experiences at Auschwitz. In stunningly poetic prose, he provides unparalleled access to the horrors he faced in the concentration camp. Including photos from Eddy's life before, during, and after the Holocaust, this poignant memoir is at once a moving love story, a detailed portrayal of the atrocities of Auschwitz, and an intelligent consideration of the kind of behavior-both good and evil-people are capable of. Never before published in English, this book is a vital and enduring document: a testament to the strength of the human spirit, and a warning against the depths we can sink to when prejudice is given power.

"As a young man, Joseph Goebbels was a budding narcissist with constant need of approval. Through political involvement, he found personal affirmation within the German National Socialist Party. In this comprehensive volume, Peter Longerich documents Goebbels' descent into antisemitism and ideology and ascent through the ranks of the Nazi party, where he became an integral member Hitler's inner circle and where he shaped a brutal campaign of Nazi propaganda. In life and in his grisly family suicide, Goebbels was one of Hitler's most loyal accolytes. Though powerful in the party and in wartime Germany, Longerich's Goebbels is a man dogged by insecurities and consumed by his fierce adherence to the Nazi cause. Longerich engages and challenges the careful self-portrait that Goebbels left behind in his diaries, and, as he delves deep into the mind of Hitler's master propagandist, Longerich discovers first-hand how the Nazi message was conceived. This complete portrait of the man behind the message is sure to become a standard for historians and students of the holocaust for years to come"--.

This contextualized narrative of the Nazi rise to power, the Holocaust, and Hitler's post-invasion plans for Russia explores the private wartime diary of Alfred Rosenberg, Hitler's 'chief social philosopher'. It also chronicles the hunt for the diary, which was lost for almost three quarters of a century.

"For decades the story of Ravensbr?ck was hidden behind the Iron Curtain, and today it is still little known. Using testimony unearthed since the end of the Cold War and interviews with survivors who have never talked before, Sarah Helm has ventured into the heart of the camp, demonstrating for the reader in riveting detail how easily and quickly the unthinkable horror evolved. Far more than a catalog of atrocities, however, Ravensbr?ck is also a[n] ... account of what one survivor called 'the heroism, superhuman tenacity, and exceptional willpower to survive.' For every prisoner whose strength failed, another found the will to resist through acts of self-sacrifice and friendship, as well as sabotage, protest, and escape"--Amazon.com.

The devastating story of Poland's Jedwabne during World War II, which was the basis of Jan Gross's controversial Neighbors (2001). Based on the author's encounters with witnesses, survivors, murderers, and their helpers between 2000 and 2004, this book raises important questions about the responsibility of Poles for the Holocaust and about how the 1,600 Jewish inhabitants died in Jedwabne.

On March 26, 1942, the first mass registered transport of Jews arrived in Auschwitz--all young women between the ages of sixteen and twenty-two. Among those nine hundred and ninety-seven young Jewish women was #1716, Rena Kornreich, a Pole hiding in Slovakia. A few days later, her sister Danka #2779 arrived and so began a trial of love and courage that would last three years and forty-one days, from the beginning of the Auschwitz death camp, to the death march, and on to the end of the war. Rena's Promise stands out from other Holocaust memoirs not only in the length of time she spent in the camps, but in the spirit of love she maintains throughout her ordeal. No other survivor from the first transport has ever written about her experience (too few survived) when the women's camp was part of the men's camp, and the only men were Polish and Russian POWs. Within a few days that would all change.

Examines the roles women played in Germany and other countries for Hitler, before and during World War II.