My Review:
Nonna Bannister has been keeping diaries most of her life. Many young women have done so, but in her case she recorded actual historical events from a perspective not often given. Nonna was a young woman born in Russia and living during World War 2 had many experiences we read stories of. But for her, it was not something she talked about or anyone even knew she experienced as she had locked them away and just lived her life with forgiveness and a sweetness of spirit.
Oh my goodness!!! This has got to be one of the best books I have read this year so far. I am not sure what struck me more, her heart of forgiveness and sweetness, even though the horrors she had lived through, the loss of her entire family, the horrors she witnessed as a young girl or the fact she did not speak of them, but recorded them for her family later. One thing that especially made this interesting to me was the town she lived in was the same town my husband was born in. His grandmother would have probably lived there at the same time or around there as well. The things Nonna recounted, I realized that this could be some of my sons family history as well, and maybe there were others who did not share their stories. It really spoke to me, her story, as she told a story not often heard, what many of the Russians went through during the holocaust. Her father’s spirit of forgiveness spoke to me so much, as he spoke to his daughter and told her that the soldiers who beat him so badly, he was dying, “were just doing what they knew.”
I highly recommend this book to anyone who loves a good biography, or wants to read an amazing accounting of this time period. I love how in her diary the editor puts in what was happening in history at that time and how she might have saw it was a little different than what actually happened, making this book a valuable historical resource. I would highly recommend it for any teens in high school, it should be on the list of things to read for high quality literature! This book gets 5 stars! – Martha
It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old…or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!
You never know when I might play a wild card on you!
and the book:
The Secret Holocaust Diaries: The Untold Story of Nonna Bannister
Tyndale House Publishers (March 4, 2010)
***Special thanks to Vicky Lynch of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. for sending me a review copy.***
Nonna Bannister was a young girl when World War II broke into her happy life. She went from an idyllic early-twentieth-century Russian childhood, full of love and comforts, to the life of a prisoner working in labor campsthough she was not a Jeweventually bereft of her entire family. But she survived the war armed with the faith in God her grandmother taught her and a readiness to start a new life. She immigrated to America, married, and started a family, keeping her past secret from everyone. Though she had carried from Germany the scraps of a diary and various photographs and other memorabilia, she kept it all hidden and would only take it out, years later, to translate and expand her writings. After decades of marriage, Nonna finally shared her secret with her husband . . . and now he is sharing it with the world. Nonna died on August 15, 2004.
Visit the author’s website.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDDGG1lRcl8&hl=en_US&fs=1&color1=0x5d1719&color2=0xcd311b]
Product Details:
List Price: $14.99
Paperback: 336 pages
Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers (March 4, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1414325479
ISBN-13: 978-1414325477
AND NOW…THE FIRST CHAPTER: