Reviews tagging 'Sexual harassment'

The Librarian of Auschwitz by Antonio Iturbe

8 reviews

oceanwriter's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional informative inspiring sad medium-paced

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

4.0

Honestly, I could spend the entirety of this review simply gushing over the prose to the point where I want to learn Spanish just so I can see if the original words are even more beautiful than the translation. This is the second book by Antonio Iturbe I’ve read and it didn’t disappoint. 

 

Based on the true story of Dita Kraus’ days in Auschwitz, the book follows her and her family who have been sent to a part of Auschwitz set up to fool the Red Cross and keep the mistreatment of prisoners under wraps. There, Dita and her block mates form a secret school for the children where they pass along smuggled books. Dita puts herself at risk delivering these books but is more concerned about evading the notorious Dr. Josef Mengele. Despite being in the ‘safe’ block, they are still very much in Auschwitz. 

 

There are so many beautiful quotes in this book. This made up for a sometimes stale delivery (which might be due to being translated). My interest in the plot faded in the middle though picked back up again toward the end. It’s definitely a long book for historical YA but does maintain a fast pace. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Antisemitism, and Genocide

Moderate: Violence, Suicide, and War

Minor: Sexual harassment

grandslamdenny's review against another edition

dark emotional inspiring sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Antisemitism, Child death, Death of parent, Genocide, Gun violence, Death, Forced institutionalization, Hate crime, Murder, Religious bigotry, Torture, and War

Moderate: Excrement, Medical content, and Suicide

Minor: Incest, Racial slurs, Sexual harassment, Sexism, and Grief

leila_reads_too_much's review

challenging dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Police brutality, Racism, Violence, Death of parent, Excrement, Gore, Hate crime, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Xenophobia, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Body horror, Child death, Medical trauma, Physical abuse, Vomit, War, Antisemitism, Child abuse, Grief, Gun violence, Confinement, Death, Religious bigotry, and Torture

Minor: Pandemic/Epidemic and Sexual harassment

calamitywindpetal's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative sad medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Child death, Violence, Child abuse, Genocide, Death of parent, Antisemitism, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Sexual violence and Sexual harassment

Minor: War

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

fenouil's review

challenging dark emotional funny hopeful reflective sad

• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Suicide, Mental illness, Death, War, Gun violence, Excrement, Child death, Antisemitism, Homophobia, Torture, Sexual harassment, Racism, Physical abuse, and Death of parent

enmcurrie's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful informative reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

This was such a powerful and beautiful book. It wasn’t without flaws, but that didn’t matter. The core of the story carried all the way through. The pace is quite slow but it definitely picks up towards the end, and the last 100 pages are definitely the most harrowing. While at times it was a little hard to completely follow along, everything threaded together by the end to create such a bittersweet storyline. It’s based on this young girl, Dita Kraus, or Dita Adler in the book, who ends up running this secret little “library” made up of 8 old books in Aushwitz, in a makeshift Jewish family camp, set up by the Nazis as a front to cover up the atrocious mass murdering they were doing from any visiting foreign representatives. Many of Dita’s peers and Dita herself do end up being transferred or moved around later on though. In the background of the plot, the book also follows a couple of young men in the SS (also real people) who manage to escape Aushwitz and its horrors.
What was so emotive about this book is how of all these poor people (from children to elderly), in the most dire and horrific of circumstances, could find happiness in the smallest of things. I also loved the message that humans simply surviving is not enough, and that we need things like literature to keep humanity alive, hence why 8 old and tattered books in a place as awful as Aushwitz-Birkenau was so important. It was incredibly sad and heart-wrenching throughout, and hard to read at times. The vivid imagery of the concentration camps and the novel’s use of free indirect speech allowing you into the other characters’ thought processes made it incredibly compelling, and knowing that so many of them don’t end up with the freedom they deserve is the worst part. I think it’s a wonderful read and all of the characters were great, but Dita will most definitely stay with me for a long time. I’m very glad she could tell her story, she’s truly remarkable. The ending was beautiful. It left you feeling incredibly sad for all the loss Dita had faced, but incredibly relieved and content that she achieved all that she did.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Antisemitism, Death of parent, Death, War, and Torture

Moderate: Slavery, Medical content, and Sexual harassment

Minor: Suicide

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