Alma’s bravery saved countless lives, bringing hope to those who had forgotten its meaning…In Auschwitz, every day is a fight for survival. Alma is inmate 50381, the number tattooed on her skin in pale blue ink. She is cooped up with thousands of others, torn from loved ones, trapped in a maze of barbed wire. Every day people disappear, never to be seen again.This tragic reality couldn’t be further from Alma’s previous life. An esteemed violinist, her performances left her audiences spellbound. But when the Nazis descend on Europe, none of that can save her…When the head of the women’s camp appoints Alma as the conductor of the orchestra, performing for prisoners trudging to work as well as the highest-ranking Nazis, Alma refuses: “they can kill me but they won’t make me play”. Yet she soon realizes the power this position offers: she can provide starving girls with extra rations and save many from the clutches of death.This is how Alma meets Miklos, a talented pianist. Surrounded by despair, they find happiness in joint rehearsals, secret notes, and concerts they give side by side––all the while praying that this will one day end. But in Auschwitz, the very air is tainted with loss, and tragedy is the only certainty… In such a hopeless place, can their love survive?This devastatingly heartbreaking yet beautifully hopeful tale proves that even in the darkest of days, love can prevail––and give you something to live for. Fans of The Choice, The Tattooist of Auschwitz and The Orphan Train will lose their hearts to this magnificent tale.

    She was a genius. Could the world handle both? A novel about Hedy Lamarr.Hedy Kiesler is lucky. Her beauty leads to a starring role in a controversial film and marriage to a powerful Austrian arms dealer, allowing her to evade Nazi persecution despite her Jewish heritage. But Hedy is also intelligent. At lavish Vienna dinner parties, she overhears the Third Reich's plans. One night in 1937, desperate to escape her controlling husband and the rise of the Nazis, she disguises herself and flees her husband's castle.She lands in Hollywood, where she becomes Hedy Lamarr, screen star. But Hedy is keeping a secret even more shocking than her Jewish heritage: she is a scientist. She has an idea that might help the country and that might ease her guilt for escaping alone—if anyone will listen to her.

    Despite surviving the horrors of the ghetto at the advanced age of 52, he was sent to a fate worse than death at the notorious death camp at Treblinka, which he immortalized in his memoirs.“On his arrival at Treblinka aboard the Holocaust train from Warsaw, Wiernik was selected to work rather than be immediately killed. Wiernik’s first job with the Sonderkommando required him to drag corpses from the gas chambers to mass graves. Wienik was traumatized by his experiences. He later wrote in his book: “It often happened that an arm or a leg fell off when we tied straps around them in order to drag the bodies away.” He remembered the horrors of the enormous pyres, where “10,000 to 12,000 corpses were cremated at one time.” He wrote: “The bodies of women were used for kindling” while Germans “toasted the scene with brandy and with the choicest liqueurs, ate, caroused and had a great time warming themselves by the fire.” Wiernik described small children awaiting so long in the cold for their turn in the gas chambers that “their feet froze and stuck to the icy ground” and noted one guard who would “frequently snatch a child from the woman’s arms and either tear the child in half or grab it by the legs, smash its head against a wall and throw the body away.” At other times “children were snatched from their mothers’ arms and tossed into the flames alive.” “Wiernik escaped Treblinka during the revolt of the prisoners on “a sizzling hot day” of August 2, 1943. A shot fired into the air signalled that the revolt was on. Wiernik wrote that he “grabbed some guns” and, after spotting an opportunity to make a break for the woods, an axe...”

    Telling of the siege of Leningrad, of glittering dinner parties with Nazi leaders, and of trains disgorging bodies in war-devastated Romania, Malaparte paints a picture of humanity at its most depraved.Kaputt is an insider’s dispatch from the world of the enemy that is as hypnotically fascinating as it is disturbing.

    Ricks, a dual biography of Winston Churchill and George Orwell, whose farsighted vision and inspired action preserved democracy from the threats of authoritarianism, from the left and right alike.Both George Orwell and Winston Churchill came close to death in the mid-1930s—Orwell shot in the neck in a trench line in the Spanish Civil War, and Churchill struck by a car in New York City. If they'd died then, history would scarcely remember them. At the time, Churchill was a politician on the outs, his loyalty to his class and party suspect. Orwell was a mildly successful novelist, to put it generously. No one would have predicted that by the end of the 20th century they would be considered two of the most important people in British history for having the vision and courage to campaign tirelessly, in words and deeds, against the totalitarian threat from both the left and the right. In a crucial moment, they responded first by seeking the facts of the matter, seeing through the lies and obfuscations, and then acting on their beliefs. Together, to an extent not sufficiently appreciated, they kept the West's compass set toward freedom as its due north.It's not easy to recall now how lonely a position both men once occupied. By the late 1930s, democracy was discredited in many circles and authoritarian rulers were everywhere in the ascent. There were some who decried the scourge of communism, but saw in Hitler and Mussolini men we could do business with, if not in fact saviors. And there were others who saw the Nazi and fascist threat as malign but tended to view communism as the path to salvation. Churchill and Orwell, on the other hand, had the foresight to see clearly that the issue was human freedom—that whatever its coloration, a government that denied its people basic freedoms was a totalitarian menace and had to be resisted.In the end, Churchill and Orwell proved their age's necessary men. The glorious climax of Churchill and Orwell is the work they both did in the decade of the 1940s to triumph over freedom's enemies. And though Churchill played the larger role in the defeat of Hitler and the Axis, Orwell's reckoning with the menace of authoritarian rule in Animal Farm and 1984 would define the stakes of the Cold War for its 50-year course and continues to give inspiration to fighters for freedom to this day. Taken together, in Thomas E. Ricks' masterful hands, their lives are a beautiful testament to the power of moral conviction and to the courage it can take to stay true to it, through thick and thin.

    This is his story.Born in 1925 in the Jewish ghetto in Radom (Poland), Manny soon realized that people of Jewish faith were increasingly being regarded as outsiders. In September 1939 the Nazis invaded, and the nightmare started. The city’s Jewish population had no chance of escaping and was faced with starvation, torture, sexual abuse and ultimately deportation.Outcry is the candid and moving account of a teenager who survived four Nazi camps: Dachau, Auschwitz, Vaihingen and Neckagerach. While being subjected to torture and degradation, he agonized over two haunting questions: "Why the Jews?" and "How can the world let this happen?" These questions remain hard to answer.Manny’s brother Stanley had jumped off the cattle wagon on the way to the extermination camp where his mother and younger brother were to perish. Desperately lonely and hungry, Stanley stood outside the compound hoping to catch a glimpse of Manny and their father. Once he discovered that they were among the prisoners, he turned himself in. The days were marked by hunger, cold, hard labor, and fear. Knowing that other members of the family were in the same camp kept them alive. Since acknowledging each other would have meant death, they pretended to be complete strangers.Manny relates how he was served human flesh and was forced to shave the heads of female corpses and pull out their teeth. Cherishing a picture of his beloved mother in his wooden shoe, he miraculously survived the terror of the Polish and German concentration camps together with his father and brother.When the Americans arrived in April 1945, Manny was little more than a living skeleton, with several broken ribs and suffering from a serious lung condition, wearing only a dirty, ragged blanket.This autobiography was written to fulfil a promise Manny made to himself during the first days of freedom. By publishing his Holocaust memoirs, he wants to ensure that the world never forgets what happened during WWII. The narrative is personal, unencumbered and direct.Outcry touches the reader with its directness and simplicity. The story is told through the eyes of an old man forcing himself to relive years of intense suffering. It is an account of human cruelty, but also a testimony to the power of love and hope. Memoirs worthy of being adapted for the big screen."I read this book with a very heavy heart and tears running down my face. For Manny's endurance and his brother Stanley to be so tested is truly a testament to life! Bad people can do all the harm you want, but if one never gives up, the enemy will never win. Manny and his brother along with others, won. This is proven in this Holocaust book. A book well worth reading and learning from now and for future generations. It proves 'We will survive' ... Very well written as it goes straight to the reader's heart! The pictures are a treat, past, present and future, with a lovely tribute to his beloved, Mimi. Thank you for sharing 'YOU' with the rest of the world, Mr Steinberg! Bless you always.""Manny Steinberg shares his extraordinary teenage story of surviving four concentration camps in an account noteworthy for its straightforward, unencumbered narrative. His is a story almost everyone can imagine happening to themselves - no less harrowing than more dramatic renditions of Holocaust survival, but somehow more compelling, and universal, for the unembellished simplicity of his style.""You must read Outcry. You will have tears and joy how this young boy survived the six years in concentration camps in Poland and Germany. It is a hand-made story for a motion picture. Hollywood producers and directors, grab it. We must not allow this to happen again to human people."

    Based on expert reactions, we have come to the conclusion that the investigation team’s conclusion that the betrayer was most probably Arnold van den Bergh is not adequately supported by the available factual material. We apologise to anyone who feels offended by this book. This applies in particular to the surviving relatives and other family members of Arnold van den Bergh.Ambo|Anthos publishersUsing new technology, recently discovered documents and sophisticated investigative techniques, an international team—led by an obsessed former FBI agent—has finally solved the mystery that has haunted generations since World War II: Who betrayed Anne Frank and her family? And why?Over thirty million people have read The Diary of a Young Girl, the journal teen-aged Anne Frank kept while living in an attic with her family in Amsterdam during World War II, until the Nazis arrested them and sent Anne to her death in a concentration camp. But despite the many works—journalism, books, plays and novels—devoted to Anne’s story, none has ever conclusively explained how the Franks and four other people managed to live in hiding undetected for over two years—and who or what finally brought the Nazis to their door.With painstaking care, former FBI agent Vincent Pankoke and a team of indefatigable investigators pored over tens of thousands of pages of documents—some never-before-seen—and interviewed scores of descendants of people involved, both Nazi sympathizers and resisters, familiar with the Franks. Utilizing methods developed by the FBI, the Cold Case Team painstakingly pieced together the months leading to the  Franks’ arrest—and came to a shocking conclusion. The Betrayal of Anne Frank is their riveting story. Rosemary Sullivan introduces us to the investigators, explains the behavior of both the captives and their captors and profiles a group of suspects. All the while, she vividly brings to life wartime Amsterdam: a place where no matter how wealthy, educated, or careful you were, you never knew whom you could trust.

    Denis Barnham, a young and inexperienced flight lieutenant, spent ten hectic weeks on this indomitable island; he left a well-ordered English aerodrome for the chaos and disillusionment of Luqa. His task was to engage the overwhelming number of enemy bombers, usually protected by fighter escorts, and shoot down as many as possible. The Spitfires were bomb-scarred and battered; often they could only get two or three in the air together and the airfields were riddled with bomb craters, but they managed to keep going and they made their mark on enemy operations. The author has written a powerful account of his experiences in Malta starting with his trip out in an American aircraft carrier through the ceaseless battle and turmoil during the desperate defense of the island, until his departure by air back to England, having seen the reinforcements safely landed and the tide of battle turning. His descriptions and illustrations of the air action are thrilling, but terrifying. It is at times a very grim story but told with humor and compassion to bring, arguably, one of the best firsthand accounts of aerial combat ever written.

     The 1st Marines stormed the Pacific island of Peleliu. Captain Hunt and his company of two hundred and thirty-five men were among some of the first to land; forty-eight hours later, only seventy-eight of them were alive. Outnumbered and outgunned by the enemy, they beat off all attacks with a courage which is at the same time matter-of-fact and superhuman individual, yet collective and drawn from the real comradeship of men who cannot let each other down. Here are dramatic accounts of wounded men miraculously still fighting, of two men seen in silhouette at night against the flashes of guns in a death struggle atop a cliff, of the flame-scarred bodies of Japanese in caves and pillboxes, of a nervous and badly scared youngster shooting one of his own comrades. When, at last, relief came and Captain Hunt and his handful of men staggered back to the beach, they had withstood three terrible counterattacks and killed more than five hundred enemy soldiers. “Coral Comes High is an unpretentious, stark, blow-by-blow story of a terrible action, well told in the fewest possible words” Time Magazine “This is a story of fighting men told by a fighting man.” General Alexander Vandegrift, United States Marine Corps. Captain Hunt served in the 1st Regiment of the 1st Marine Division in the South Pacific and was decorated with the Silver Star medal and the Navy Cross. He received the Navy Cross for his part in the action described in this book. The citation for this decoration relates how Captain Hunt's company of riflemen was reduced to thirty-four men; how these survivors defended an isolated position "against three counterattacks killing four hundred and twenty-two Japanese.” After the war he worked as a writer and editor for Fortune and Life magazines. Coral Comes High was first published in 1946 and Hunt passed away in 1991.

    Approved by both the Anne Frank House Foundation in Amsterdam and the Anne Frank-Fonds in Basel, run by the Frank family, this work of literary criticism unravels the complex, fascinating story of the diary and effectively makes the case for it being a work of art from a precociously gifted writer.

    As the Russians closed in on Hitler from the east and the Allies attacked from the west, American soldiers discovered a secret Nazi effort to engineer a master race of the finest purebred horses. With the support of U.S. general George S. Patton, a passionate equestrian, the Americans planned an audacious mission to kidnap these beautiful animals and smuggle them into safe territory—assisted by a daring Austrian colonel who was both a former Olympian and a trainer of the famous Lipizzaner stallions.

    Sebag-Montefiore also relates new details about the genesis of the code, little-known facts about how the Poles first cracked the Luftwaffe's version of the code (and then passed it along to the British), and the feverish activities at Bletchley Park. Based in part on documents recently unearthed from American and British archives--including previously confidential government files--and in part on unforgettable, firsthand accounts of surviving witnesses, Enigma unearths the stunning truth about the brilliant piece of decryption that changed history.

    Johtje Vos, a Dutch housewife, hid Jews in her home and repeatedly outsmarted the Gestapo. Law student Hannie Schaft became involved in the most dangerous resistance work--sabotage, weapons transference, and assassinations. In these pages, young readers will meet these and many other similarly courageous women and girls who risked their lives to help defeat the Nazis.            Twenty-six engaging and suspense-filled stories unfold from across Germany, Poland, the Netherlands, France, Belgium, Denmark, Great Britain, and the United States, providing an inspiring reminder of women and girls’ refusal to sit on the sidelines around the world and throughout history.An overview of World War II and summaries of each country’s entrance and involvement in the war provide a framework for better understanding each woman’s unique circumstances, and resources for further learning follow each profile. Women Heroes of World War II is an invaluable addition to any student’s or history buff’s bookshelf.

    5. Yet behind the public persona is a complicated woman of intrigue, shadowed by mysterious rumors. The Queen of Paris, the new novel from award-winning author Pamela Binnings Ewen, vividly imagines the hidden life of Chanel during the four years of Nazi occupation in Paris in the midst of WWII--as discovered in recently unearthed wartime files.Coco Chanel could be cheerful, lighthearted, and generous; she also could be ruthless, manipulative, even cruel. Against the winds of war, with the Wehrmacht marching down the Champs-Élysées, Chanel finds herself residing alongside the Reich's High Command in the Hotel Ritz. Surrounded by the enemy, Chanel wages a private war of her own to wrestle full control of her perfume company from the hands of her Jewish business partner, Pierre Wertheimer. With anti-Semitism on the rise, he has escaped to the United States with the confidential formula for Chanel No. 5. Distrustful of his intentions to set up production on the outskirts of New York City, Chanel fights to seize ownership. The House of Chanel shall not fall.While Chanel struggles to keep her livelihood intact, Paris sinks under the iron fist of German rule. Chanel--a woman made of sparkling granite--will do anything to survive. She will even agree to collaborate with the Nazis in order to protect her darkest secrets. When she is covertly recruited by Germany to spy for the Reich, she becomes Agent F-7124, code name: Westminster. But why? And to what lengths will she go to keep her stormy past from haunting her future?

    Long after her grandmother’s death, she found a shoebox tucked in the closet containing photographs of her grandmother with a mysterious stranger, a cryptic telegram from the Red Cross, and a drawing signed by Picasso. This discovery sent Freeman on a decade-long quest to uncover the significance of these keepsakes, taking her from Picasso’s archives in Paris to a secret room in a farmhouse in Auvergne to Long Island to Auschwitz. Freeman pieces together the puzzle of her family’s past, discovering more about the lives of her grandmother and her three brothers, Jacques, Henri, and Alex. Their stories sometimes typical, sometimes astonishing—reveal the broad range of experiences of Eastern European Jews during Holocaust. This thrilling family saga is filled with extraordinary twists, vivid characters, and famous cameos, illuminating the Jewish and immigrant experience in the World War II era. Addressing themes of assimilation, identity, and home, this powerful story about the past echoes issues that remain relevant today.