I absolutely agree with Edgar. I read this book last year after hearing the author speak at JW3, the Jewish Community Centre in North London.
It's a truly fascinating story. Finkelstein's mother came from a Berlin family who escaped to Amsterdam but were then rounded up and sent to Belsen. His father came from an affluent family in Lemberg/Lviv who were caught by Stalin's police and sent to live in penal conditions in Kazakhstan. One of his reasons for writing the book was that, in post war London, some people knew about the horrors of the Nazi Holocaust but hardly anyone knew about the horrors of Stalin's Russia. At his presentation he made the audience laugh by saying that an alternative title for the book was "it's not a competition". I found this film of him talking about the book on You Tube. I haven't watched this but I expect it to be similar to the presentation I saw https://youtu.be/rdIb0t_sEr4?si=1yITdue2XQTRjLgq Kind regards Alan Alan Gavurin (m) 07973 424357 On Wed, 30 Jul 2025, 12:38 Edgar Hauster, <[email protected]> wrote: > Czernowitzers... > > I would like to highly recommend this Sunday Times bestseller to you. This > “Family Memoir of Miraculous Survival,” as the author refers to it, draws > numerous parallels to the fate of the Bukovina Jews. As with Daniel > Finkelstein, the consequences of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact were equally > fatal for our ancestors too, who were caught between the Nazi Holocaust and > Stalinist terror. This book, historically accurate and vividly written, is > hard to put down until you have finished reading it. > > This is also implicitly the story of the Vienna Holocaust Library and its > founder, Dr. Alfred Wiener, Daniel Finkelstein's grandfather: > > https://wienerholocaustlibrary.org > https://whlcollections.org/search/ > > If you enter “Czernowitz” in the search field of the Vienna Digital > Collections, the first result you get is the “Report from the > Einsatzkommando 10b; Execution of Jews at Czernowitz” dated 09-JUL-1941 in > German AND in English translation: > > https://whlcollections.org/image/1655-1688/ > > Several years ago, I researched the “Fokschaner Family History in > Czernowitz” and found the Vienna Holocaust Library to be an extremely > valuable source: > > > https://www.amazon.de/photos/share/hPuvPedOXAwobOaCHfPe3CMleuOAjETQREr603m3S2F > > I wish you all an insightful and exciting read! > > Edgar Hauster [MacBook] > > ******************************************************************************* > This moderated discussion group is for information exchange on the subject > of > Czernowitz and Sadagora Jewish History and Genealogy. The opinions > expressed > in these posts are the opinions of the original poster only and not > necessarily > the opinions of the List Owner, the Webmaster or any other members > or entities connected with this mailing list. The Czernowitz-L list has > an associated web site at http://czernowitz.ehpes.com that includes a > searchable archive of all messages posted to this list. Beginning in > 2021, > archived messages can be found at: > https://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ > > To send mail to the list, address it to <[email protected]>. > > To remove your address from this e-list follow the directions at > https://it.cornell.edu/lyris/leave-e-lists-lyris > > To receive assistance for this e-list send an e-mail message to: > [email protected] > > ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- ******************************************************************************* This moderated discussion group is for information exchange on the subject of Czernowitz and Sadagora Jewish History and Genealogy. The opinions expressed in these posts are the opinions of the original poster only and not necessarily the opinions of the List Owner, the Webmaster or any other members or entities connected with this mailing list. The Czernowitz-L list has an associated web site at http://czernowitz.ehpes.com that includes a searchable archive of all messages posted to this list. Beginning in 2021, archived messages can be found at: https://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ To send mail to the list, address it to <[email protected]>. To remove your address from this e-list follow the directions at https://it.cornell.edu/lyris/leave-e-lists-lyris To receive assistance for this e-list send an e-mail message to: [email protected] -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
