The Gustav Sonata, by Rose Tremain

The Gustav Sonata, by Rose Tremain (2016)

 Gustav Perle grew up in poverty in Switzerland in the years at the end of World War II.  His father died when he was too young to have any clear memory of him and is mother, whom he adores, is distant and bitter.  In kindergarten, Gustav befriends Anton Zweibel, a boy his same age, who is a promising musician.

 The novel is written in three parts.  In Part One, Gustav and Anton are young boys who are constant companions.  Anton’s family, who are wealthy, take Gustav on vacations with them.  Emilie, Gustav’s mother is not keen on Anton and his family because they are Jewish.  She is bitter because she blames her husband’s death on saving Jews during the War.

 Part Two focuses on Emilie and her early life and how she fell in love with Erich Perle.  Erich was an Assistant Police Officer.  In his position, he helped Jewish refugees into Switzerland after the country had closed its doors.  When his actions were discovered, he lost his job and was reduced to finding a menial job with poor pay.  Although Emilie loved Erich and called referred to him as a hero, she could never forgive him for plunging the family into poverty.

 Gustav and Anton are middle-aged in Part Three.  After having been separated for years, each with his own life, the two friends come together again.  The bond they formed as children remained strong.

 This was a beautifully written novel.

5 Stars

Read:  May 28, 2021

 

The Book of Lost Names, by Kristin Harmel

The Book of Lost Names, by Kristin Harmel (2020)

 

The premise of this book is interesting.  It is about forgers during World War II who created false documents to save French Jews during World War II.  Instead, the book reads like a young adult sanitized version of Nazi-occupied France.

 

Eva Traube is a 20-something young woman who lives in Paris with her parents.  Although Eva was born in France, her parents are Polish immigrants.  As the Nazi’s begin rounding up Jews, her father is arrested, but Eva and her mother escape to a small town in southern France’s “Free Zone.”  Apparently, Eva had some talent as a budding artist, thus, created some forged documents that aided in their escape.

 

Soon she become involved in an underground resistance group and begins forging documents to help young Jewish children escape into Switzerland.  Although the dialogue is stilted and unrealistic (she asks questions that, as a Jew, she should have known), she does realize that by creating new identities for these children, she is, in effect, erasing their past.  This bothers her, and she wonders how these children will be able to reunite with their parents after the war.

 

One of her collaborators in drafting forged documents is Rémy, a young Catholic.  Together, they devised an elaborate code to identify the children with both their real names and their forged names.  Eva and Rémy record these coded names in an old obscure religious text found the parish church’s library.

 

While Eva is working on these documents with Rémy, they form a budding romance.  Her mother, however, frets about this relationship because Rémy is not Jewish.  Her mother sits around and broods about her missing husband and accuses Eva of abandoning her faith.

 

As the War continues, Eva becomes involved in activities that stretch the imagination, especially considering that she appears as being very naïve.

 

This was a very quick read, and something that I could see myself enjoying when I was about 12 years old.  The characters were not fully developed and the book did not depict the actual horrors and fears of living in France during the Nazi occupation.

Read: March 23, 2021

3 Stars 

The Lost Letter

The Lost Letter, by Jillian Cantor (2017)

This Holocaust novel alternates between Austria in 1938 and 1989 Los Angeles.  

 

In 1938, young Kristoff, an orphan who had no family life, finds himself an apprentice to Frederick Faber, a Jewish engraver who specialized in making stamps.  Faber was a famous for his engraved stamps.  As an apprentice, Kristoff lives and dines with the family.  Although not a Jew himself, he finds himself attracted to the Shabbat rituals and prayers.  He also has a crush on Faber’s 17-year-old daughter, Elena.

 

In Los Angeles in 1989, Kate Nelson is struggling through a painful divorce and a father suffering from dementia.  She has just placed her father in a nursing home and is going through his belongings.  He had been a stamp collector and Kate had wonderful memories as a child going with her father as he sought out his “gems”.  She takes his stamp collection to be appraised, thinking that there might be something of value that can be sold to help defray the costs of his medical care.

 

She takes the stamps to Benjamin Grossman, a philatelist, for his appraisal.  He discovered among the collection an unopened letter with a unique Austrian stamp.  It was the picture of an Austrian church with a small unauthorized edelweiss on its steeple.  The letter was addressed to one of Faber’s daughters, and the stamp appears to have been a Faber design, but seemed to have been issued after his apparent death.

 

Still thinking that the stamp might be of value, Benjamin and Kate locate Fraulein Faber in hopes of discovering the mystery of the edelweiss on the stamp.

 

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel.

 

Read:  October. 27, 2020

 

4.5 Stars

 

 

The Tattooist of Auschwitz, by Heather Morris

The Tattooist of Auschwitz, by Heather Morris (2018)

The Tattooist of Auschwitz is based on the experiences of Lale Sokolov and Gita Furman who were deported to Auschwitz in the early 1940s, and remained there until the end of World War II.

Lale was a young Slovakian Jew who was rounded up, ostensibly for construction work, in 1942.  He soon found himself a prisoner at Auschwitz.  At the time he was taken, he was not aware of the full extent of Nazi actions.  Because he spoke several languages, he became the assistant to a French Jew named Pepan, the tattooist.  Pepan took Lale under his wing and taught him the art of tattooing.  Although he despised the work, he learned to keep his head down and tattooed the numbers on the arms of Jews entering the camp.  One day his tattooist mentor disappeared, he Lale became the primary tattooist.  This position gave him privileges not afforded other prisoners.

One day, he tattooed the arm of a young women.  Although she had already been shorn of her hair, he thought she was beautiful.  He learned her name was Gita and she was a prisoner at Birkenau.  She, too, was given a “job” at Auschwitz, which provided her with some protections.  The two young people were able to arrange meetings and they fell in love.

Because of Lale’s position and privileges, he was able to smuggle extra rations of food and clothing to some of the other prisoners.  Lale did what he had to do to survive and to try to keep some of his fellow prisoners alive.

When the War ended, Lale and Gita were separated, however, they continued to search for each other, as well as their family members.  Ultimately, they found each other and after the War, they married.  They ended up living in Australia.  He kept his work as at tattooist secret for many years for fear that he would be considered a Nazi collaborator since his work in the Auschwitz kept him alive.

After Gita died, Lale met with the author and told his story.  It is a fascinating tale of love and survival amid unthinkable horror.

Read:  November 19, 2019

4 Stars

By Fire, By Water, by Mitchell James Kaplan

By Fire, By Water, by Mitchell James Kaplan (2010)

By Fire, By Water is a historical novel about the Spanish Inquisition.  Many of the characters in the novel, including the main character, Luis de Santágel, Hernando de Talavera, and Cristóbal Colón, were real people.

Luis de Santágel was the royal chancellor of Aragon, and a converso, a Jew forced to convert to Christianity.  De Santágel retained an interest in his Jewish heritage, although that was becoming more dangerous with Tomás de Torquemada’s views on anyone not believing in the “true faith.”

De Santágel was influential in the court of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, however, he knew that his role in the court was tenuous due to his Jewish background. After the murder of the Inquisition’s Chief Inquisitor, Pedro de Arbués, de Santágel realizes that Torquemada’s tactics are much more horrific than previously encountered.  After the Inquisitors arrest both Luis’ son, Gabriel, and his brother, Estefan, Luis sees just how far Torquemada will take his pursuit to extract confessions of faith from non-Christians.

Religious issues become even more complicated when the Catholic monarchs descend into Granada and force out the Moors, who had built a large and peaceful society.  Spurred on by religious fervor, Queen Isabella issued an edict expelling all Jews from the kingdom.

In the meantime, Cristóbal Colón, has De Santágel ear and needs an advocate to convince the Court to help fund an exploration to India across the expanse of the ocean.

No story would be complete without a love story.  De Santágel met the beautiful Judith Midgel, and her nephew, Levi, who are secret Jews.  All of this leads him to explore his abandoned Jewish faith.

This novel brings this period of history to life and the characters are seem very real.

As a side note, in the novel, Levi accompanied Cristóbal Colón on his voyage to be a translator.  He was the only non-sailor on the voyage.  In fact, there was a non-sailor translator listed in Colón’s logs whose name was listed as Luis de Torres, a transliteration of the Hebrew name, Levi Midgel.

Read: September 16, 2018

4 Stars

The Last Watchman of Old Cairo, by Michael David Lukas

The Last Watchman of Old Cairo, by Michael David Lukas (2018)

The Last Watchman of Old Cairotakes place over a millennium, from 1000 years ago when Ali became the night watchman of the Ibn Ezra Synagogue in Cairo, to the late 1890s, when Solomon Schechter and the Smith twins, Agnes and Margaret, “discovered” and saved the documents stored in the synagogue’s geniza, to present day Joseph al-Raqb, who traveled to Cairo, Egypt to learn about his father.  The synagogue is said to house the legendary Ezra Torah Scroll, which was written centuries before the birth of Christ.

In alternating chapters, we learn Cairo during three periods of history.  Ali’s story takes place around the year 1000. He was a young Muslim orphan who was hired by the synagogue council to be its night watchman.  As he learned his job, he also became fascinated by Jewish traditions, while maintaining his own religious beliefs.  In the late 1890s, Solomon Schechter (1847 ~ 1915) was in Cairo to search for the Ezra Torah Scroll.  With him were the middle-aged widowed twins Agnes Smith Lewis (1843 ~ 1926) and Margaret Smith Gibson (1843 ~ 1920), who were real people (although probably did not join Schechter on this quest).  The sisters were known for having discovered the Syraic Sinaiticusand were Biblical scholars in the Presbyterian Church.  In present day, Joseph al-Raqb, is a young American graduate student, raised by his Jewish mother, but whose father is Muslim.  A few months after his father’s death, Joseph received a mysterious package from his father.  This led him back to Cairo to find out why the object was sent to him.

In alternating chapters, the focus is on one of the above periods of history.  In Jewish tradition, texts with G~d’s name are sacred.  When such texts become worn or unusable, they must be treated with respect and not just thrown out.  Traditionally such texts are either buried or stored in a geniza.  The geniza in the Ibn Ezra Synagogue is a small room in the attic.

When portions of sacred texts are found being sold on the black market, Solomon Schechter traveled to Cairo to seek out the documents.  He had the documents saved and sent to Cambridge University, where they are still held.  [This is true.]

In family tradition, the eldest son of the al-Raqb family (with Ali being the original night watchman).  Joseph’s father was the eldest son, hence was the night watchman.  He held this position until after the Yom Kippur War when an event occurred in which he was unable to keep a mob from the synagogue. Joseph became fascinated in his quest to determine the fate of the Ezra Scroll.

The novel doesn’t take a position on the religious tradition per se, but does raise issued confronted by religious scholars in studying ancient documents.

I was totally absorbed by this novel.  Michael David Lukas also wrote The Oracle of Stamboul, which is a historical novel about the last days of the Ottoman Empire.  I read this book about 7 years ago and very much enjoyed that as well.

Read: August 8, 2018

5 Stars

The Nightingale

The Nightingale, by Kristin Hannah (2015)

The Nightingale is the story of two French sisters who, each in her own way, survive the Nazi occupation of France during World War II.  The sisters are 10 years apart in age, and are motherless with a cold father who was a changed man after returning from World War I.

Vianne, the older sister, married young to the love of her life.  Her younger sister, Isabelle, was impetuous, and had been expelled from several boarding schools before the War began.  After Vianne’s husband goes off to war, Vianne is left at the family home with their young daughter.  Isabelle’s childhood heroine was Edith Cavell, who was executed in World War I.  Isabelle wants to follow in Cavell’s footsteps and joins a Resistance group, leading downed British and American soldiers cross the Pyrenees from France into Spain.  Her code name is The Nightingale, which also happens to be the English translation of their family surname ~ Rossignol.

This novel focuses on the lives of the women during the war and the sacrifices they were forced to make while their fathers, husbands and brothers were fighting.  The novel begins in 1939, just before Nazi occupation.  As France is forced into War, the Nazis begin rationing food and occupying homes.  A young German officer requisitions her home, although he is kind to Vianne and her daughter.  One day Vianne is asked to provide the names of the Jews in her town.  Believing that it is simply a list of names, she complies, giving up the name of her best friend and neighbor, Rachel.  Later, the Nazis begin rounding up all the Jews and communists.  Rachel is taken away, but Vianne takes her young son to raise as her own.

Later a brutal SS officer commanders her home and brutally rapes her.  Meanwhile, Isabelle is risking her life in the Resistance.  She acquires false papers and becomes known as Juliette Gervaise.  She doesn’t fully understand the risk she is taking until after she is capture.  She is ultimately sent to a German concentration camp, where her mantra become “Stay alive.”

This book gives the horrors of war and captures the terror of the citizens of France.  It is one of the best novels of the Holocaust that I have read in a long time.

5 Stars

Read:  February 14, 2016

Henna House

Henna House, by Nomi Eve (2014)

This novel traces the story of Adela Damari, a Yemenite Jew, from her childhood in rural Yeman in the 1920s and 1930s to her move to Israel under Operation On Wings of Eagles. 

5 Stars

Read: May 31, 2015

The Storyteller

The Storyteller, by Jody Picoult

This is a holocaust fiction, story that was very well written and very well researched.

5 Stars

Read: February 2, 2014

The Lost Wife, by Alyson Richman

Read: April 28, 2013

The Invisible Bridge, by Julie Orringer

Read: January 6, 2012

Books Set in Medieval Europe: France

Maggie Anton has written a series of books about the three daughters of Rashi. Salomon Ben Isaac, better known as Rashi (Rabbi Shlomo Itzachak) was born in 1040 and died in 1105. He is one of the most famous Talmudic scholars of his age. He had no sons, but taught his daughters Talmud during a time when women were not typically educated.

Rashi lived in Troyes, France, and established a Yeshiva there. He also had a vineyard to support his family, his wife and three daughters. Anton carefully researched this time period to incorporate not only biblical knowledge and Rashi’s writings, but minute details of life in France during this time period. Each book describes superstitions, sexual rituals and marital relations, the celebration of Jewish holidays, childbirth and life-cycle events.

The series is interesting and clearly well researched.

Rashi's Daughters: Book 3: Rachel, by Maggie Anton (2009)

Rachel is Rashi’s the youngest and most beautiful daughter. She is madly in love with her husband, Eliezer.

This book is set during the First Crusade. Marauders of the First Crusade massacre nearly the entire Jewish population of the Germany city of Speres, where her father began his Talmudic studies. Eliezar is a merchant who travels frequently to Spain, where the Sephardic Jewish tradition is vastly different from that in France. Eliezer wants Rachel to join him there, but she fears life there. In France, she has the freedom to pursue her religious studies and maintain her business of wool manufacturing. In Spain, she will be forced to stay out of the public eye. Marital customs are also vastly different in the Sephardic community. Eliezar takes a second wife. When Rachel learns of this, she is, of course, saddened. This give Anton an opportunity to explore the Jewish laws regarding divorce.

Read: November 6, 2009

Rashi's Daughters: Book 2: Miriam, by Maggie Anton

Miriam was Rashi's middle daughter. The love of her life died after they were engaged, but before they married. This created a sort of "widowhood" for Miriam. Miriam eventually marries a man who is filled with longing for other men. Thus, Anton explores homosexuality during this time period. Miriam and Judah eventually settle into a loving but sexless marriage, after the birth of their four children.

Miriam becomes a midwife, a trade she learned from her Aunt Sarah. In addition, she learns to become a mohel. The community, however, is not ready for a female mohel, so she must rely on family members to have sons to preform circumcisions.

Read: April 13, 2009

Rashi's Daughters: Book 1: Joheved, by Maggie Anton (2005)

Rashi's eldest daughter was Joheved. Anton explores daily life of women during the latter part of the 11th Century. She discusses love and sex in the context of marriage as well as the laws of niddah, or the separation between man and women during and after a woman's monthly period. Joheved is also responsible for assisting in the family's wine trade. Anton provides details of the practices of vintners at this time in history.