by Sandra Merville Hart
Book 3: The Noose Closes
I shunned from the title of this book yet it is aptly named.
Newhouse has written a fictional story based on chronicles of events that were written during WWII. Jews in Poland lived through a nightmare. This story begins with Ben Ostrowski’s frantic worry for his wife and two-year-old daughter. German soldiers had come for all the children in Lodz Ghetto. His wife wouldn’t allow her daughter to leave without her and both were taken in September of 1942.
Ostrowski can barely function at his job, but he must. Those who don’t work are in danger of deportation. Where did the trains go? It was rumored that people were taken to farmlands up north. He wanted them to be safe and happy … he wanted to believe it, yet the increasing atrocities dictated by the Germans and their Jewish Chairman say otherwise.
This story chilled me even as it held me in its grips. It was difficult to read and impossible to put down. Well-written. Terrifying. Poignant.
Tragic.
The author’s parents managed to survive the misery and danger of Lodz Ghetto but never talked about their experiences. Many of his relatives did not survive Auschwitz. His parents never talked about their experiences. The haunting shadow of the Holocaust compelled Newhouse to write this trilogy. His message? “Never again to anyone, anywhere.”
Amen.
Sandra Merville Hart 