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What On Earth Am I Doing Here? A Story of Surviving and of Visits to the Scenes of the Crime

by:
Dov Ronen (Author)

ISBN: 0-7414-4635-9 ©2008
Price: $10.95
Book Size: 5.5'' x 8.5'' , 150 pages
Category/Subject: BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Personal Memoirs

Biographical account of surviving the Holocaust in Hungary, visits in Hungary and Germany after years of boycotting them, and of battling trauma and a sense of guilt for having survived.

Abstract:
What on Earth Am I Doing Here? is the real-life story of a child and his brother escaping from the ghetto in a provincial town in Hungary, thus surviving the Holocaust, and his visits in Hungary and Germany after some thirty years of boycotting them. The narrative takes the reader from the two boys hiding in a room as Anne Frank did, managing with fake identity cards during the siege of Budapest along with their mother, then to snippets from his adult life, battling with trauma and a sense for guilt of having survived.

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Customer Reviews

  , 08/22/2008
Reviewer: Samule Osher, M.D.
Your story is a real triumph of ingenuity and the will to survive . . . Despite having read other accounts of the Holocaust, there is something more real and more horrifying about yours . . . the protagonist.” Samuel Osher, MD

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  , 08/22/2008
Reviewer: Robert Melson
I found [your book] very affecting and could not put it down until the end. The story as story is suspenseful and horrifying: I still can see Thomas and Peter and their mother walking in the procession of Jews with their hands up to the Auschwitz-transport in Budapest when his mother directs the boys to flee down an alley. On such split-second decisions did their lives depend! Some of the most affecting writing is about what happened to your family after the war. You survived, but could not avoid catastrophe. There is something especially cruel and perverse in your father's dying of a misdiagnosed illness when you reached Israel after having survived the Final Solution. It was almost as if some cruel deity had said to the family: "just because you've escaped gassing in Auschwitz and reached 'the promised land,' don't think you're home free: I have a very unpleasant surprise for you!" What does such an experience do to a child? He must be left not only bereft but feeling that at bottom the world is dangerous, cruel, and incomprehensible, and he's not far from the truth.” Robert Melson, author of False papers: Deception and survival in the Holocaust

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  , 08/22/2008
Reviewer: Virginia Weiss
I received [your] book yesterday and read it all in one swoop last night. ….I am so glad [you] wrote it, not only for [your] family, but for the rest of the world. Every person's Holocaust story is different, but each has its own unique horror. It is so important to preserve these very difficult memories, particularly as the world forgets or denies. All the questions that cannot be answered--I understand about that, too. I am glad that he was lucky and that, in those terrible times, he had a loving family and found some "righteous" ones. Virginia Wise

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  , 08/22/2008
Reviewer: Dan Piser
I read your story Dov. I was moved by the intermittent fearful situations you had to face at such a tender age, especially since they are set off by periods of concern by 'regular' folks who helped your family. The alternations, I would think heightened, the intensity of the terrifying times. Your bravery in reexamining this excruciating time is also impressive. As you know, I see lots of people who don't quite make the commitment to undermine their 'daemons' and so stay encased in their fear or anxiety. I understand, as you said, one book isn't enough to completely 'free' you but it must be some relief to get some of these memories a little bit away from the center of your heart.“ Dan Piser

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  , 08/22/2008
Reviewer: Stanley Hoffmann
I was moved and shocked by your book—moved by the wonderful, understated way in which you describe the horrible events that you had to endure, shocked by the sufferings inflicted on you and your family. It is really a superb memoir, written with so much feeling and, despite the nature of the events, generosity and humor. The same fate befell millions of people, and yet every story is unique, and I learned a great deal about Hungary and Slovakia from your account—and about you, of course. Stanley Hoffmann, Paul and Catherine Buttenwieser University Professor, Harvard University

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  , 08/22/2008
Reviewer: Inge S. Hoffmann
I did finish reading your story just now… Above all else—above the trauma, and honesty—there is the mastery of the tale, the mastery of style… [The book] has great usefulness for all who need to learn to treasure their lives, their family… Inge S. Hoffmann

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  , 08/22/2008
Reviewer: Mildred Siegel
I finished [reading] the book today. I couldn’t put it down. The sadness doesn’t leave me, nor does the awe at what you and your family lived through and what you lost.

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