A devastatingly incredible read. With eye-opening truths, infinite hope & undeniable family bonds this true story by Jeremy Dronfield is nothing short of exceptional.
What attracted me to his book is how it truly is a 'true story'. There is a family photograph of the Kleinmann's (the story's heart & centre) right at the beginning which opens the readers heart to his normal Jewish family living in Vienna, as Austrian citizens, in the 1930's.
The detailed journey that unravels as this tight knit family's world shatters before their eyes is told in depth largely through the lens of father & son, Gustav & Fritz, who experienced the inhumane Austrian & German concentration camps over the coming years. The undeniable luck that deemed in favour of the Kleinmann male's lives some could say stemmed from Gustav's consistent hope that there would be an end. That their day of freedom would come. & it did.
After 6 years of clinging on by a thread, day in day out, secret scribbles in diaries & close attempts to revolt, the two miraculously walked free again in 1945. It is this knowledge which makes the story, with all of its devastating details, that little bit easier to read.