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5.0
challenging dark emotional informative tense medium-paced

 CW: graphic depictions of WWII

Budapest was a thriving cosmopolitan capital city in the 1930s, allied with Germany early in WWII and flipped allegiances late in the war, and became the site of gruesome war atrocities, vicious combat, and the extermination of Jews. The Last Days of Budapest spans from pre-WWII through the German surrender to the Soviets, but focuses primarily on 1943-1945. In 1945, the city was devastated as the Germans and Soviets fought street to street, building to building, and sometimes room to room, and a lot of that fighting is still evident 80 years later where Buda is largely under restoration and reconstruction.

I'm finishing reading this on April 16 completely by coincidence. Today is the day that Hungarians mark as their Holocaust Remembrance Day, when in 1944, they began sending Jews to the ghettos, where many were later shipped via train directly to Auschwitz. As LeBor writes, like all of the countries who aided the Germans, Hungary still grapples with their role in the Holocaust. It's a both-things-can-be-true situation, as a central part of this history focuses on zi0nists and their role in helping European Jews escape to Palestine. It can be an important component of WWII and Holocaust history and also troubling to today's war atrocities. The book doesn't address today's situation, because that isn't its focus, but I wanted to be transparent here

The book is graphic, taken from many first-hand accounts. LeBor is a journalist, and served as foreign correspondent in Budapest from just after the fall of the Soviet Union. It's a part of history I was far less familiar with until recently, because most of what I learned from WWII in high school focused on the western front, and learned only because I traveled to Poland and Hungary in 2024, where it's impossible to remain unmoved by the tragedies of WWII. This is the first English language book focusing on Budapest during this era, and reflects a lot of what I learned in museums across Europe last summer (we started in Gdansk with the fall of Communism, and worked our way south through Auschwitz and to Budapest, so these horrors evoke visceral memories having recently seen these sites). I'm not sure if I would have picked up this book if I hadn't recently visited - I tend to stay away from WWII history - but I'm really glad I did.

I spent the bulk of my time reflecting on what the early days of deportation looked like in 1940s Europe, and what they look like in 2025 in the US. The wealthy - even the wealthier Jews - of Budapest spent the early war still enjoying the rich night life of their city, insulated from the politics of the war. This hit hard, and feels like an unintentional call to reflect and act now.

As I often do with nonfiction, I listened to the audiobook. Fair warning to anyone: if listening makes you visualize more than using your eyes, do not listen. The graphic nature of a lot of this content may distress you.

Thank you to PublicAffairs and Hachette Audio for an eARC and ALC for review. The Last Days of Budapest is out 4/22/25. 

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