In December, we asked BJV readers to share some of the Jewish books that they thought our readers might enjoy. Here are some suggestions that Linda Burghardt, journalist and scholar-in-residence at the Holocaust Memorial & Tolerance Center (as well as BJV contributor and Federation presenter) has for us. Thank you, Linda!
The celebrated poet Muriel Rukeyser once said, “The world is made up not of atoms, but of stories.” I have happily found this to be a belief worth holding close, and it has made me a devoted reader of fiction. To me, while non-fiction tells us facts about the world, fiction gives us truth.
I find this to be especially relevant when it comes to difficult subjects, ones that are hard to take in, not only because of a plethora of names and dates and statistics, but also because of the emotions they bring up.
The Holocaust is one such subject. As the child of survivors, I found the idea of the Holocaust compelling but nearly impossible to approach. But then I found I could do so, as long as I was willing to embrace the characters, settings and stories in Holocaust-related fiction.
Here are a few of the books that made this terrible piece of reality knowable to me, and let me in to secrets that both enhanced my world and deepened my grasp of history.
The Invisible Bridge, by Julie Orringer
From a small Hungarian town to the grand opera houses of Budapest and Paris, Andras Levi travels through a world about to be lost to the Nazis, as 1937 opens and a harrowing saga of war unfolds around a jewel-box romance. Profound love, familial bonds, and deep personal loyalties will be tested as the young Jewish student faces the devastation of the Holocaust with nothing to shield him but the steadfastness of the human heart.
The Enemy Beside Me, by Naomi Ragen
As the head of an organization in Tel Aviv that seeks to bring Nazi war criminals to justice, Milia Gottstein has dedicated her life to making sure that the voices of Holocaust victims will never be silenced. But when she brings her work to Lithuania and tries to force the government to admit their historic responsibility for annihilating almost their entire Jewish population, including her own family, she is confronted with choices that threaten to betray all she has achieved.
Once We Were Brothers” by Ron Balson
A master storyteller, Ron Balson explores a number of critical themes that resonate deeply even today. Two boys, once as close as brothers, find themselves on opposite sides of the Holocaust, each struggling to survive in whatever way they can. Now, some 60 years later, a wealthy Chicago philanthropist is accused of being a former Nazi officer by a man who is sure he knows him. Is he right? Is this the poor abandoned child his family took in and raised as their own, the one who betrayed them all in the end?
Those Who Save Us, by Jenna Blum
When secrets from the past come down through the generations as hazy shadows that dim the natural light between mothers and daughters, the raw reality of an untold war can generate shame instead of love. All Trudy has of her silent mother’s story is a single photo of the two of them together with a Nazi officer. Will she be able to recreate the past and understand what her mother had to endure to survive the Holocaust, and maybe even forgive her for the way she was raised?