Reviews tagging 'Hate crime'

The Librarian of Auschwitz by Antonio Iturbe

17 reviews

ems_rxlibrary's review against another edition

dark emotional informative inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

This book was beautifully written and a haunting tale of rebellion even when your life is on the line. 
Dita and her mother were a couple of the prisoners in Block 31 in Auschwitz. This block in particular was set up to try and fool the world that these camps were not death camps, so the children had a barrack where they would go every day and play with the other children. Even though it was forbidden, some books were smuggled in and it became Dita’s job to protect and hide them. 
I was hooked from the foreword, honestly. The author told Dita before they parted, “Everyone knows about the largest library in the world. But I am going to write about the smallest library in the world and its librarian.” 
I could tell how much time and effort this author put into researching this novel. 
I did feel like the novel suffered a little from the shifting POVs. Sometimes it was from one paragraph to the next with no break to let you know that we were shifting to another POV, so it was easy to get lost at times, but it was still worth it. 
This book made my list of must read books about the holocaust! So good. If you are a lover of historical fiction and a lover of books, I can’t imagine that you won’t like this.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Antisemitism, Hate crime, Homophobia, Death, Genocide, Physical abuse, and Torture

Moderate: Death of parent and War

Minor: Sexual assault and Sexual harassment

lauramcc7's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, War, Racism, Murder, Hate crime, Antisemitism, Excrement, Homophobia, Child death, Death of parent, Death, Cursing, Forced institutionalization, Physical abuse, Xenophobia, and Suicide

delz's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative inspiring sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

It must not be an easy task to write a respectful yet entertaining Holocaust story, but The Librarian of Auschwitz is one such novel. The framework of the story is based on a real Jewish girl, Dita Kraus who was 9 years old when the Nazis started their “final solution.” As a 15 year old, Dita became the Librarian of Auschwitz’s, very secret makeshift library that held 8 books. She was part of a secret school in the only camp that housed children, The Family Camp. It was a “front,” so that if a humanitarian group like the Red Cross were to do inspections the Nazis would show this camp where, they believed they were treating the inmates well. Many times survival was just a matter of chance, but on occasion if you were very clever you could workout a way to survive another day. While people lost faith in god and even their fellow man, someone would come along and surprise Dita in their humanity. This is a powerful story of strength and love, love of family and the power of friendship.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racial slurs, Religious bigotry, Child abuse, Confinement, Genocide, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Antisemitism, Body horror, Death, Forced institutionalization, Medical content, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Death of parent, Excrement, Hate crime, Murder, and War

mjwilliamson's review against another edition

dark emotional informative reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.25

I enjoyed this book, though saying that makes me feel weird. It was very sad and thought provoking. The idea that these were real people, a real place and real stories was probably the most terrifying thing about it all. But that was also what kept me engaged. I needed to know what happened to these people through it all. Their surroundings were so desolate and depressing that it, in a way, made it feel like I needed to protect them. I would highly recommend this book to anyone.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Forced institutionalization, Genocide, Gore, Mental illness, Injury/Injury detail, Terminal illness, Religious bigotry, Suicide, Confinement, Death, Death of parent, Grief, Excrement, Hate crime, Racism, Violence, War, Xenophobia, Antisemitism, Body horror, Chronic illness, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Murder, and Racial slurs

lauren_e_d's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

This book was captivating. It was emotional, strong, and a testament to the people and the strength they had in the holocaust. I loved seeing all the different stories and how they ended, even if it was not how I hoped. It was a fascinating new view on the holocaust and it was even better and emotional knowing it was true. The character changes were slightly confusing at times, but overall awesome. This book was amazing, heartbreaking, strong, emotional, and powerful. Definitely recommend. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Genocide, Hate crime, Religious bigotry, and War

juliannem's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Antisemitism, Death, Death of parent, Forced institutionalization, Genocide, Hate crime, and Murder

Moderate: Suicide

Minor: Torture, Sexual harassment, Excrement, and Child death

valeriabee's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

 I never understood the desire to be entertained by people's traumas? This book is based on the life of Dita Kraus, and the author took some artistic liberties by fictionalizing parts of her story. For this reason, it is hard to tell what is true and what is not. I have seen people complain that the narration lacks emotion or passion, but I don't see why that emotion needs to be exaggerated when you're dealing with the genocide of a people. Despite being uncertain about the accuracy of the details, I found the book to be honest. You get the sense of dejection, anger, fear, hopelessness, helplessness, rebellion, and perseverance from the prisoners of Auschwitz. The book is honest about deception, it is honest about the desire to be hopeful, the desire to escape, the desire to survive. There were disturbing moments when you realize some prisoners would take advantage of the more vulnerable for their own survival. At the end of the day, they were all desperate to survive. 

I saw someone on GoodReads that they prefer this novel to The Diary of a Young Girl because they found Young Girl to be boring. It is icky to me to desire entertainment from a book about such terrible traumas. I was moved by the honesty of the narrative, independent of the accuracy. It is not five stars because the weird limbo between reality and fiction confuses the narrative. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Antisemitism, Body horror, Child death, Confinement, Death, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Forced institutionalization, Genocide, Hate crime, Homophobia, Medical trauma, Murder, Sexual assault, and Torture