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Three Sisters–survival in the midst of death
Three Sisters
by Heather Morris
I present to you a review for a book that will transport you unwillingly from Slovakia into the death camps of Auschwitz and Birkenau. The horrors are especially difficult to read about because this novel was so well researched including interviews with primary sources, two of the three sisters who are protagonists in Heather Morris’ Three Sisters. The third sister had passed away before the author began this project. Unlike some survivors of the concentration camps, these sisters talked about their experiences to people who wanted to hear, especially their family members. These relatives were a treasure trove of information about the camps, the Nazi selections of individuals, hiding from the SS, and the kindness and treachery of nonJews.
Family, of course, is very important to Cibi, Magda, and Livi, the three sisters. Their father makes them promise to always stay together and support each other. Their grandfather gives them the mantra of “hope and strength” which they carry with them through the worst of times. Later they can joke about bad conditions by comparing them to the deprivation they experienced in the camps.
Three Sisters is a hard book to read, but another worthwhile reminder to not allow this history to repeat itself. Ironically, the last part of the book which was about happier times brought the strongest emotional response from me. This reaction is a tribute to Heather Morris as a storyteller who, despite the tragic subject matter, brings her characters to life in such a way that you feel like you really know them and you understand them as much as is possible as an outside observer.
I recommend this book. I know these characters will stay with me for a long time.
I received a complimentary copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.
Rating: 5/5
Category: Historical Fiction, Literary Fiction, Women’s Fiction
Notes: by the author of The Tattooist of Auschwitz
Publication: October 5, 2021—St. Martin’s Press
Memorable Lines:
As the plaintive cries of their families fade, new voices—angry, hate-filled voices—greet them as they make their passage through the town. Their former friends and neighbors are hurling rotten fruit and stale bread at their heads, yelling their joy that the Jews are finally leaving. Cibi and Livi are stunned by the taunts, the full-throated bile being dispensed from snarling mouths.
…they will never forget their desperation to put something, anything, in their stomachs. These days they savor every mouthful, but, more than that, they cherish the freedom to move around the city as they choose, no longer under the watchful and penetrating gaze of a kapo or worse, an SS officer.
Cibi thinks about the space in her heart where God used to live and wonders, for a second, if the peace she feels in her sisters’ arms is a sign that maybe He never really left.
Conan Doyle for the Defence–real life detection
Conan Doyle for the Defence
by Margalit Fox
As a lover of mysteries, I enjoyed reading Conan Doyle for the Defense. Be forewarned, however, that this book is not light reading. It is the recounting of Arthur Conan Doyle’s application of Holmesian deductive skills to the real case of Oscar Slater, wrongfully found guilty of the murder of an elderly lady.
In the process of relating the details of the case, the author Margalit Fox puts the events in context. She discusses the Victorian era and the development of crime fiction, including, of course, the Sherlock Holmes mystery series. She also addresses the life and character of Arthur Conan Doyle as well as Scottish politics, police, and the penal system. Fox presents an in-depth discussion of the different types of reasoning that might be used in trying to solve crimes.
If you are looking for a beach read, Conan Doyle for the Defence is not it. If you are interested in learning more about true crime detection, and how its principles apply to fiction, then this is the right book for you.
I would like to extend my thanks to netgalley.com and to Profile Books/Serpent’s Tail for giving me the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.
Rating: 5/5
Category: History, True Crime
Notes: Includes a complete list of references, footnotes, and bibliography to support the information contained in the book.
Publication: June 28, 2018—Profile Books/Serpent’s Tail
Memorable Lines:
First joining the case in 1912, he turned his formidable powers to the effort to free him, dissecting the conduct of police and prosecution with Holmesian acumen. But despite his influence and energy, Conan Doyle discovered, he wrote, that “I was up against a ring of political lawyers who could not give away the police without also giving away themselves.”
Holmes quickly became a global sensation, not only for his investigative prowess, unimpeachable morals and ultrarational cast of mind, but also for his exquisite embodiment of an age of Victorian gentility, and Victorian certainties, that was already imperiled.
Detection, at bottom, is a diagnostic enterprise, and the late 19th century was where the shared diagnostic concerns of medicine, criminalistics and literary detection first truly converged in public life.
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