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firstwords's review against another edition
3.0
2.5 stars.
The co-author (the subject of the book, there was a second author that helped) is the granddaughter of the Nazi Commandant of the Plaszow concentration camp depicted in Schindler's List. The Commandant was play by Ralph Fiennes. That was her grandfather. Suffice it to say he was a horrible human being on virtually all counts. This woman has to deal with the past (she being the daughter of the Commandant's daughter and a Nigerian man), to confront and possibly accept both her grandfather's role, as well as the family's explanation of it (He was a good man! A good father! Your mom was horrible! Your mom was great!).
So why 2.5 stars? Editing. The book jumps chronologically, which is fine. However chronological jumps in a biography/non-fiction should still follow a narrative. You're talking about your children, then jump back in time to talk about how your mother cared for you as a child. That's fine. The mind gets what you're doing. You're talking about children, then jump back in time to talk about the amount of hair that the Russians found when they liberated Auschwitz (a different camp, no less). That does not work. The book was translated from German to English, which adds another layer, as the translation, I think, caused the story to lose some of the passion. It comes across in parts as dry, actually reading more like a Nazi accounting than a narrative. Maybe the Germans are just that dry in books, I don't know. But yeah. Editing.
The interesting story of someone of both African and European descent dealing with a concentration camp-running grandfather should have you glued to the page. Instead, in many places I simply did not care. That's bad. The writing is mediocre, the editing, inexcusable.
The co-author (the subject of the book, there was a second author that helped) is the granddaughter of the Nazi Commandant of the Plaszow concentration camp depicted in Schindler's List. The Commandant was play by Ralph Fiennes. That was her grandfather. Suffice it to say he was a horrible human being on virtually all counts. This woman has to deal with the past (she being the daughter of the Commandant's daughter and a Nigerian man), to confront and possibly accept both her grandfather's role, as well as the family's explanation of it (He was a good man! A good father! Your mom was horrible! Your mom was great!).
So why 2.5 stars? Editing. The book jumps chronologically, which is fine. However chronological jumps in a biography/non-fiction should still follow a narrative. You're talking about your children, then jump back in time to talk about how your mother cared for you as a child. That's fine. The mind gets what you're doing. You're talking about children, then jump back in time to talk about the amount of hair that the Russians found when they liberated Auschwitz (a different camp, no less). That does not work. The book was translated from German to English, which adds another layer, as the translation, I think, caused the story to lose some of the passion. It comes across in parts as dry, actually reading more like a Nazi accounting than a narrative. Maybe the Germans are just that dry in books, I don't know. But yeah. Editing.
The interesting story of someone of both African and European descent dealing with a concentration camp-running grandfather should have you glued to the page. Instead, in many places I simply did not care. That's bad. The writing is mediocre, the editing, inexcusable.
aretz's review against another edition
4.0
An enjoyable and heartbreaking piece. I feel the ending went on a little too long as the momentum ended with the parting of her mother and it would have been better if her time in Israel were spread in the middle of the narrative rather than the end and then circled back for chronology's sake, but this in no way diminishes what has happened here. I get sad that we get closer and closer to having no survivors of the camps left and the possibility that we will forget the meaning of the events and the horrors created from it all.
iluv2fly1's review against another edition
4.0
This is a really personal memoir about adoption and family secrets and depression and identity. It goes into a ton of things. I really enjoyed it although at times it felt a little difficult - maybe kind of over dramatic. But it's really hard to know how I would feel in this kind of situation. I suppose it was just kind of fascinating to explore this extreme case.
I really loved the dual authors thing. Normally that kind of thing is difficult to follow, but it really felt like these two kind of gave context and kept everything flowing.
I really loved the dual authors thing. Normally that kind of thing is difficult to follow, but it really felt like these two kind of gave context and kept everything flowing.
biblioberuthiel's review against another edition
3.0
When I first started this book I was pretty perplexed by all of the mixed reviews, as I found it incredibly fascinating. However, after finishing I see the various points people have made. This story is horrifying and fascinating. As a memoir, I think it suffers from a few things.
1) The story itself is so unimaginably sensational that once one recovers from the initial horror, the rest is fairly unexciting in comparison.
2) This isn't a story about Amon Goeth. It just isn't. It's a personal memoir about Jennifer Teege. People who read this expecting a lot of historical background or similar will, doubtless, be disappointed. It just isn't what this book is.
3) This book would have benefited from some more editing - which may have to do with the fact that it's a translation. It was a bit repetitive and inconsistent.
Overall, however, a really interesting story.
1) The story itself is so unimaginably sensational that once one recovers from the initial horror, the rest is fairly unexciting in comparison.
2) This isn't a story about Amon Goeth. It just isn't. It's a personal memoir about Jennifer Teege. People who read this expecting a lot of historical background or similar will, doubtless, be disappointed. It just isn't what this book is.
3) This book would have benefited from some more editing - which may have to do with the fact that it's a translation. It was a bit repetitive and inconsistent.
Overall, however, a really interesting story.
msliz_31's review against another edition
3.0
Imagine being in a library one day and stumbling across a book in which your birth mother reveals that your grandfather was one of the most heinous Nazi war criminals, Amon Goethe? That is the journey Jennifer Teege, a biracial woman of color, takes readers on in My Grandfather Would Have Shot Me. While coming to grips with the fact that she shares DNA with one of the most repugnant human beings in history, Teege is also reconciling her feelings of love she has for the grandmother who loved and worshipped Goethe. How could her grandmother have possibly loved her while also loving this man and being a Nazi sympathizer? Teege's story is also about her struggle with depression and how she yearns for and continues to have a relations hip with her birth mother who gave her up for adoption when she was a child. The format of the book goes back and forth between Teege's voice giving us insights into her thoughts, feelings and experiences as she looks to perform a sort of post-generational mea culpa for her grandfather actions, and the voices of those close to her (her adoptive parents and siblings, friends and her husband) and their observations of her through this process of self-discovery and healing. At time the back and forth works well, but there are times where it seems a little disjointed; perhaps this is attributed to the translation. One area that I found lacking in the story was why she made the assertion that her grandfather would have shot. I know it goes without saying that the reason is because she is biracial, which Goethe and his ilk found to be an abomination, but in all the detail Teege provides, IMO she does not delve deep enough into the exploration of Nazi ideology against people of color and other marginalized groups. While it is known of the atrocities the Nazi's perpetrated against the Jewish community, rarely is the same attention given to how they also persecuted people of color, members of the LGBT community and the handicapped. All in all, this is a compelling read and offers a different perspective on another set of victims of the Holocaust: the descendants of the war criminals.
lee_lily's review against another edition
2.0
The story itself is interesting but the way this is written is very stilted. I took issue with how Jennifer introduced the situation to her parents and how she she stopped addressing them as her parents but instead by their first names. I also didn't like how she tried to humanize and separate her grandmother's inaction and acceptance of her grandfather's actions when she clearly stood by the torture without regret.
schnick's review against another edition
4.0
Ein sehr gutes Buch, das sich gut lesen lässt und ein sehr interessantes Thema behandelt. Das einzige, was mich ein bisschen gestört hat, ist der Schreibstil, ansonsten aber ist das Buch empfehlenswert.