What I'm Reading: A Fifty-Year Silence

A Fifty-Year Silence: Love, War, and a Ruined Year in France
by Miranda Richmond Mouillot
Broadway Books (Jan. 19, 2016)
Memoir

What it's about:

A memoir by a young woman who travels to France to uncover the truth about her grandparents' mysterious and irrevocable estrangement and pieces together the extraordinary story of their wartime experiences.


Why You'll Love It:

• Richmond Mouillot conjures the charms of the French countryside and the intimacy of small-town life precisely and elegantly.
• Amid the abundance of books from Holocaust survivors and the children of those affected by the war, few nonfiction accounts of the Holocaust and World War II have been written from the perspective of the grandchildren. A Fifty-Year Silence explores the afterlife of the past for young Jewish people today and provokes an important dialogue about the inheritance of historical memory.
• As a debut author and a young woman navigating the conflicting imperatives to remember the past and embrace her future, Richmond Mouillot writes with a warmth, directness, and honesty that will endear her to many readers.  

What Else You Should Read:

• The Nightingale by Kristen Hannah
• The Journal of Hélène Berr by Hélène Berr
• Behind Enemy Lines by Marthe Cohn

The Zookeeper's Wife by Diane Ackerman

The Zookeeper's Wife
by Diane Ackerman
Norton, 2007

Summary in a Sentence:

Relates the story of Jan and Antonina Zabinski, zookeepers at the Warsaw Zoo, who helped save the lives of approximately three hundred Polish Jews during World War II by housing and feeding them on zoo grounds and teaching them how to "pass" as Aryan.

My Thoughts:

Ackerman pulls from Antonina Zabinski's extensive memoirs of her experiences in World War II Poland and from her own research on the topic to tell the story of the hundreds of Jews that passed through this particular stop on the Polish Underground. Although this book is highly informative and at times extremely touching, I found it hard to feel fully engaged. I don't really know why this is; I'm extremely interested in the Holocaust and I'd read some great reviews on the book. Initially, I thought maybe I had hit some sort of wall and have read too many books on the subject, but then remembered that I had just recently read and loved a new book on one of the most famous figures in Holocaust history, Anne Frank. I felt that the book was slightly rambling and didn't really stay on topic as I expected it to. Ackerman's research certainly shines through, although at times her attention to detail is perhaps too great. I struggled to finish this one.

~ This book counts towards the Four Month Challenge  and the Take Another Chance Challenge ~

You might also like:

• Schindler's List by John Keneally 
• Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky
• Witnesses at War: Children's Lives under the Nazis by Nicholas Stargardt
  

Other reviews:

• Caribousmom
• Sophisticated Dorkiness 
• BookNAround
  

Anne Frank: Her life in words and pictures

Anne Frank: Her Life in Words and Pictures
from the archives of The Anne Frank House
Roaring Brook, 2009
215 pages
Genre: nonfiction/biography
Source: Library




Summary in a Sentence:

A photographic introduction to the life and experiences of Anne Frank, who along with her family and others lived in hiding from the Nazis in a secret annex from July 1942 until their capture in August 1944.

My Thoughts:

I clearly remember reading Anne Frank's diary for the first time: I was in fourth grade and we had just studied the Holocaust in school. My mom had a copy of the diary from when she was young, and I poured over the words of this girl from not so long ago and was mesmerized by her story. Ever since, I have been deeply interested and affected by so many people's stories from that dark period in history. I always come back to the story of Anne Frank, though, and this new book released from the archives of the Anne Frank House is such a wonderful tribute to her diary and her life.

Anne and Margot at the beach, 1935.

The book is primarily a pictorial history of the life of Anne Frank and her family, beginning with photos of her parents' wedding in 1925. An amazingly large amount of the Frank family's family photos were somehow preserved throughout the hiding process and the subsequent discovery of their hiding place in 1944. Interspersed with the pictures are quotes from Anne's diary and various commentaries on the photos.

"I don't want to have lived in vain like most people. I want to be useful or bring enjoyment to all people, even those I've never met. I want to go on living even after my death!"

This book is a great stand-alone introduction to Anne Frank and also a helpful companion to the diary and to those who are already familiar with her life. It is a powerful reminder of all the lives, all the families, that were destroyed in the Holocaust. Anne Frank put a face on the more than 1 million children who perished under Hitler's regime.


For more information, please visit The Anne Frank Museum website.

You might also like:

• Anne Frank: The book, the life, the afterlife by Francine Prose
• Anne Frank Remembered by Miep Gies