Two Roads Home by Daniel Finkelstein
British journalist Daniel Finkelstein’s memoir TWO ROADS HOME is the extraordinary story of his family’s survival from the Holocaust.
Finkelstein’s grandfather was a leading German Jewish intellectual who early on warned of the coming horrors. While archiving Nazi crimes, he relocated his family to Amsterdam, where they felt they would be safe, but safety was an illusion. When her school friend, Anne Frank went into hiding, Daniel Finkelstein’s mother Mirjam, also a child, was sent to Bergen-Belsen with her mother and sisters.
Finkelstein’s father, Ludwik, grew up in a wealthy Jewish family in Poland. His father, Dolu, was a veteran of the Great War, but when Stalin took control, Dolu was deported to Siberia and Ludwik and his mother were sentenced to forced labor in Kazakhstan.
TWO ROADS HOME is the compelling story of their survival – the forged passports, close encounters, and harrowing circumstances – thoroughly researched and meticulously accounted for by one of the leading journalists of our time. Finkelstein used personal testimonies, historical research, personal diaries, and letters to stitch together these two remarkable family stories – one side victims of the Nazi’s and the other victims of the Soviets. A moving account of the unspeakable horrors of the Holocaust, told through the lived experiences of his family. A witness to the atrocities inflicted upon innocent victims by the unholy alliance between two megalomaniac totalitarian dictators, and a reminder of what happens when power is not held in check.
