Micro Reviews - connected books (10 & 11)

 

Changing the way we think about the Dutch experiences of World War Two

A few years ago I read and reviewed Bart van Es's book The Cut Out Girl which opened my eyes to another side of the Dutch experience in WW2, as I said then the prevailing feeling is that the Dutch had a good war, protected the Jews and stood up for the Nazis but this really isn't the case.

Nina Siegal's The Diary Keepers (William Collins) uses the extensive archives of WW2 Diaries held in Amsterdam to tell a rounded story of WW2 as people recorded at the time.

The book includes many voices but concentrates on diaries from a Nazi-sympathising Dutch policeman, an ardent  female Nazi party supporter, an ordinary factory worker, a Jewish woman working for the Jewish Council, a Jewish journalist held in Westerbork Concentration Camp for well over a year, and a Christian woman at the heart of a resistance ring who protected dozens of Jewish people.

With Siegal's commentary framing entries a much fuller picture of Holland between 1940 and 1945 this was eye opening, even for me who has read so much around the Holocaust. There's lots of balancing views given but the reader is left to draw their own conclusions overall - and who knows how any of us would actually act if we were in the same situation.

After finishing this book I was approved for a book on NetGalley called My Friend Anne Frank by Hannah Pick-Goslar (Ebury Publishing). Pick-Goslar was, like Anne Frank, a German Jewish girl who's family had moved to Amsterdam in the 1930s. She was good friends with Frank and lived next door to them- she is mentioned in several times in Anne's diary.

However this book is so much more than someone tagging on to Frank's fame. While Pick-Goslar did survive the war, and Belsen-Bergen, her account of her experiences is one of the most moving Holocaust accounts I've read and I think that it does the incredible story a disservice to market it in terms of being about Anne Frank.

It tied in so nicely with The Diary Keepers  as many of the people Pick-Goslar talks about in Amsterdam are also featured in depth is Siegal's book and both narratives help build a full picture of the choices people had to make and of how life was at the time.

Pick-Goslar's account of liberation from the camps and her physical recuperation was as gripping as her actual wartime life, and filled in more of the "what came next" narrative for me. I really hope that this book does become as important in the Holocaust memoir cannon as Anne Frank's Diary.

End of summer break reading

Uni goes back in a matter of days and so I've spent the past few days indulging in a real orgy of reading to finish a few books I know I don't want to put off until we have a break in November.

First up was Nora Webster by Colm Toibin.

Not officially published until October 7th, I read an advance copy thanks to Netgalley.

This held me captivated on a slow train journey to Cambridge and back, it follows a couple of years in the life of one family as they come to terms with the death of a family member.  In many ways this is a gentle book, very much in the vein of Maeve Binchy, but underneath all of this is a darker undercurrent that keeps you off balance and unsure as to where the plot is going to take you.
I became totally involved in the whole Webster family and my sympathies with individual characters changed all the time as we learned more about them.  This isn't a challenging book, but it is quite haunting and certainly a great read.

My next book was Travelling to Work by Michael Palin.

I've said before that I am a sucker for diaries and Palin's are no exception.  I always liked the films Life of Brian & Holy Grail plus the Ripping Yarns series and I can watch and re-watch Palin's epic travel series and enjoy them each time so it goes without saying that I'd like jump on the diaries.

The third volume doesn't disappoint, it is full of tiny details about Palin's life as well as asides about people in the entertainment world - but if you aren't interested in diaries or Palin then the book really won't be for you!

Palin is known as a really nice guy - and I'm afraid that I have to agree after meeting him a few years ago - but he rails against this from a very early stage. His diaries won't do much to dispel the image but I loved the hours I spent reading the tome!

The final book for the weekend was H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald

I love birds of prey, and I'm lucky enough to have spent a day learning to handle them and another learning how to photograph them.  I think that if I has the time and money I would consider owning my own.

This is something that is shared by Helen Macdonald and in fact she has gone further and is a qualified falconer and has owned several breeds.

This volume is part autobiography, part falconry manual and part biography of author T H White and it totally blew me away.

After the sudden death of her father Helen decides to buy and train a goshawk, one of the hardest birds of prey to train and fly. The book then mixes memories of her father, insights in to training Mabel and much more.  Several times the book brought tears to my eyes, it is very personal and beautifully written and deserves to become a classic book.

H is for Hawk is published but I read a copy again provided by Netgalley.