Clara's War: One Girl's Story of Survival

By Clara Kramer

A book Jimmy found for me at the library (I should put that in more often, he usually finds a few good books for me every week at the library)

Heartbreaking, beautiful, so sad. A book recalling Clara's experience hiding in Poland during the Nazi occupation based on the diary she kept during that time as a fifteen year old girl. In contrast with Anne Frank's diary,  this story is told by an old woman referencing the diary she kept while in hiding. The weight of the years she had to carry these memories -  these stories, these images of baby limbs, the necessary suppressed grief of so many lost - in her mind force a simple, stark and heart wrenching narrative

"What Dudio hadn't prepared himself for was to witness this child's murder, his sister's son; a child he had held on the day of its birth, his bris and countless other times. The SS soldier swore and cursed as he shot little Moschele. He had enough human feeling to curse his fate that he had to commit such a crime, but not enough to save the innocent child. Who would have known? Dudio and this officer were alone. Nobody would have known.

Great is God and full of power, with wisdom beyond reckoning. God gives courage to the lowly and brings hope to the bereft." Pg. 135

"Mania's [Clara's sister] voice was now in my ear, 'We were never so close before the war.'

My sister, who without a care sped through life on a bicycle with a skipping rope wrapped around her neck, was now cutting my heart open with every word. All the famous and learned rabbis in the history of our town could not stand up to the razor's edge of such words. Truth demands truth, but how could I possibly agree to the idea that we had ever not been close? I knew my sister. From Mania it was a simply a statement of fact. I didn't say anything. Although she wasn't saying there was anything lacking in me, I knew what was lacking in my bookish, shy self. When did my wild little sister become so wise? She then told me, 'You don't like to talk about your feelings.'

Again, I could not find a single word. In every way, especially this last one, she was telling me how much she loved me. We were hiding for our lives, in danger of imminent death from so many different sources you couldn't even thing about it without going crazy or wanting to end your own life, and here she was confiding her secrets.

After a prolonged silence she said, 'I'm glad we didn't go to the nuns.'

I finally had something to say, 'Me too.' I said. Her love simply filled me up Her last words that night were: 'I'll be quiet now. Good night.' She closed her eyes and in a moment I could hear her steady breathing. I was happy too. Such happiness as perhaps I have ever felt. What is this creature that God has made, that even as our families were slaughtered and each moment might be our last, we could still feel such love? Perhaps this was the greatest miracle of all." Pgs. 150 - 151

"My tears were coming now. Julia was questioned. They told her that they had caught a Jewish girl who had claimed to be cleaning house for the Becks. Julia looked right in their faces and called it an outrageous lie. She asked to see her accuser. Beck had a few more things to tell us. He had heard an SS buddy talking in a bar about a girl they had caught who said she was fro Lvov. A maid! Mania had never given us away.

Her last thoughts were to protect us at the cost of her own life. A 13-year old girl, no more than 40 kilos, stood up against the SS an the Gestapo, whose officers and men represented the collected might of the Nazi empire, and they could not break her. In the bright, bright light of such love and courage, how could I not find the will to live?

Dudio had seen the murder and had given Mr Beck a letter with the date, 19 April. Dudio wrote saying tht they had brought her to the old Jewish cemetary, shot her and dumped her body. The cemetery was ow a barren field of unmarked graves.

...I didn't know what they did to her or how much she suffered. But I did know that this had to have happened in front of dozens of people who had come out because of the fire. This had happened in our neighborhood where everybody knew and loved her. The Becks had made a choice to risk their lives to save us, but all Tilzer had to do was look away and my sister would still be alive." Pg 164

I had to look up an antihero, which I thought Mr Beck may fall under but he doesn't. He simply isn't a stereotypical hero. From wiki: "Unlikely heroes are simply characters who may not be conspicuously flawed, but simply ordinary people thrust into extraordinary circumstances." But I read that and know, he was flawed. That is what was so amazing, scary, beautiful, unusual and uncharacteristic about him. He was a man, a person like any of us who had his own family and self preservation to be considered and yet he hid EIGHTEEN JEWS in his home for TWENTY months.

He was a drunk, a wife beater and a cheat.

"They say there are no angles here on earth. But they didn't know Beck. As much as his face could be ravaged by drink and exhaustion, there was a purity and goodness in his eyes. He said, 'I just can't be part of people dying.'

It was a simple declaration. Those words kept us alive. They kept him going when his courage failed and his faith was tested. With the war raging outside and millions compromising everything they believed to stay alive, how many were like Beck? He held our lives in his hands and there was now no one on this earth I would have trusted with them more It was in moments like these that I felt most strongly that we would survive. I had never met anyone like Beck before. My father was a good man. So were all the men in the bunker. But I didn't know if they had what Beck had. I didn't know if Papa would risk my life to save a stranger We had been strangers to Beck and now it felt like we were his family. I had gone through four notebooks and the blue pencil that Beck had given me was down to a nub. Every time he gave me a new notebook, he said the same thing, 'Clarutchka, I hope you say nice things about me.' I prayed that I would live so the world would know his courage and great love."

Her notebooks eventually saved his and Julia's life.

I will always remember Mania. I will always remember Beck. Both will remind me that you do not know something based on their face value. People often surprise you. Sometimes in awful ways, and sometimes in beautiful ways.

Thank you Clara for writing this book, their memories live on inside me.

I would also send this book to my two sisters, but it is simply too sad to think about losing them in this way. I thought of them constantly throughout this book!

Book 42

Days of Fear: A Firsthand Account of Captivity Under the New Taliban

By Daniele Mastrogiacomo

 A harrowing story of an Italian journalists capture by the Taliban and the frightening details of his detention. Written with concise and descriptive language without embellishment, the stark reality of his experience hits the reader hard. Mastrogiacomo speaks honestly about the variety of fear and terror he and the others experienced. He writes about the fight to resist utter hopelessness; struggling to hold on to the belief that even the smallest crumb of hope could keep him going.

Incredible story, told in stark language.  I could not put the book down!

Book 41

A Mountain of Crumbs

By Elena Gorokhova

A wonderful memoir of growing up in the Soviet Union. Gorokhova has a gift of telling a simple story with eye opening clarity and then driving a larger point home when  you least expect it. I enjoyed her writing style and the fascinating other world she grew up in. The book was brought to my attention as a comparison to "Angela's Ashes." While definitely in the same league, this book stands on its own.

"'May your tongues fall off, all of you, godless fooligans!' yelled Baba Manya, hurriedly crossing herself. She meant to say 'hooligans.' - hooligani - but she either couldn't pronounce the h sound or didn't know the right word. That's what they all became, my mother and her three brothers - fooligans, ardent and naive, resolute and reckless, inspired by a new god, a crossbreed of hooligans and fools." Pg 4

"What I do know is that I won't smell tobacco on his hands or feel his stubble or be 'Brother Rabbit' ever again, and that knowledge makes me cry even harder, so hard that my mother breaks out of her watering trance and presses me to her soft breasts ad whispers to Marina, "Vsyo ponimaet," which means I've instantly grown up and now understand everything." Pg 93

"I feel old, as old s Borya. I feel I no longer want to work, at least not in the House of Friendship and Peace. I don't want to wait years for a promotion that will allow me to move chairs and arrange train tickets; I don't want to wait for Tatiana Vasilievna to retire, for Rita to take her place and abuse me the wame way Tatiana Vasilievna abused her. I d on't want to squeeze into a bus twice a day at dusk, at eight in the morning and at six at night, for twenty or thirty years, before I may be allowed to coordinate the entire English-speaking world." Pg 204

"'Apartheid?' Robert squints in confusion. It doesn't matter to my aunt that apartheid is happening on the other side of the world from America. The West is the West, no matter what continent. All capitalist vices here get entangled and rolled together, like mismatched threads of wool, into one hairy ball of international evil." Pg 281

Book 39

Mockingjay

By Suzanne Collins

The third book in a trilogy which began with the book The Hunger Games. This one was as compelling, exciting and heart wrenching as the last two. It is a continued story of Katniss Everdeen in a strange world run by her archenemy President Snow. In this book the revolution has come to fruition and they look to Katniss for inspiration. She struggles with those who love her to find her voice in a highly political and dangerous situation.

This series is incredibly creative and wonderfully told. I loved this book and like all the others only wished it was longer!

"'What about you Katniss? How are you managing?' Her fingertip moves in short, gentle strokes between Buttercup's eyes. 'And don't say you're fine.'
It's true. Whatever the opposite of fine is, that's what I am. So I go ahead and tell her . . . .I've stopped talking because there's really nothing left to say and there's this piercing sort of pain where my heart is. Maybe I'm even having a heart attack, but it doesn't seem worth mentioning.

'Katniss, I don't think President Snow will kill Peeta,' she says. Of course she says this; it's what she thinks will calm me. But her next words come as a surprise. 'If he does, he won't have anyone left you want. He won't have any way to hurt you.'

. . . . . 'So what do you think they will do to him?'

Prim sounds about a thousand years old when she speaks.

'Whatever it takes to break you.'" pg 150 - 151

Book 38

The Art of Racing in the Rain

By Garth Stein

This story is told through the eyes of a dog. That may immediately turn some of you off, it usually turns me off! But it came highly recommended by a friend of mine who has never steered me wrong.

Although necessarily anthropomorphizing an animal by attempting to write down in human language their experience, Garth Stein draws this story in such a way that it transcends that fact. You begin to think of the dog as a real, thinking, sentient being which ends up being properly challenging. The story itself begins to take the drivers seat and suddenly you are inside the character, the dog Enzo, looking at life unfold through his own eyes.

Through this interesting perspective we  learn the art of racing cars in the rain, love and loss. I loved what I learned about race car driving and will never see a race car without thinking about Enzo and his remarkable life.

Book 37

Foxy: My Life in Three Acts

By Pam Grier

Pam Grier writes a very interesting and entertaining autobiography. If you have any interest in the history of cinema or in Blaxploitation specifically it is an important read. Her story has some very unbelievable pieces, but in the end her survival spirit shines through.

Book 36

Mass Blog

 Once again I have been remiss in my blogging. I have the following to report:

 The Man Who Loved Books Too Much

About a (real) book thief!

Book 35

Vermillion Drift

Good honest midwestern mystery. Very enjoyable.

Book 36

Dead in the Family

Another trip down Sookie Stackhouse lane. But I enjoyed it immensely.

Book 37