Date Published: November 2019
Publisher: Gersten Weitz Publishers
Three generations tell an incredible story of survival in the poignant Holocaust memoir The Birds Sang Eulogies.The survivors Anna and Danny Geslewitz tell of their harrowing wartime experiences. Danny’s began in the Lodz ghetto in Poland, then continued in Auschwitz, then in a series of forced labor camps. Anna’s journey took her from the horrors of the Lvov ghetto to a flight into Germany to avoid death in the ghetto. The end of the war, while it ended their years of agony and deprivation, found Danny barely alive and struggling to regain his health and Anna dealing with the post-war chaos as she tried to locate family. The book then follows Anna and Danny’s daughter and granddaughter years later when they travel to Poland and record their reactions to the sites of their family’s suffering. These riveting accounts close with moving poetry written by Anna. Readers will share the sorrow and terror the poems express as they marvel at the bonds of these three generations.
Excerpt
In this poignant memoir, The Birds Sang Eulogies, Anna and Danny Geslewitz’s incredible stories of survival are told by them, their daughter and their granddaughter, three generations affected by the Holocaust. Danny’s agonizing story began the moment the Germans invaded Lodz, Poland in 1939. His harrowing story of survival begins in the ghetto where starvation and death were rampant. When the Germans liquidated the ghetto in 1944, Danny and his remaining family members were sent to Auschwitz. Danny’s description of hell on earth leaves the reader horrified. After enduring Auschwitz for three weeks, Danny and his brothers began nightmarish journeys to seven forced labor camps were they endured inconceivable deprivations. After witnessing two brothers perish, Danny is near death when suddenly the Germans disappear. Living in the eastern Polish city of Lvov, Anna vividly describes life and death in the Lvov Ghetto. When it becomes clear that the Germans will kill every remaining Jew in the ghetto, she and her sister flee into Germany. There, Anna works as a maid in German household. She lives a life of constant terror fearing that her Jewish identity will be discovered. The mayhem of liberation brings its own challenges to Anna and Danny. Barely alive, Danny struggled to regain his health. Anna scrambled to find a way to survive in the chaos and find her sister from whom she had been separated. As Danny and Anna worked to find their place in life, they meet in Germany. Together, they begin a memorable new chapter. Years later, their daughter and granddaughter travel to Poland. Their personal accounts of their trips are riveting. Anna Geslewitz was a poet. One can feel her sorrow, terror and angst as one reads her poems. The poems are included in The Birds Sang Eulogies: A Memoir.
About the Author
Ms. Raz is a retired speech pathologist and the author of the popular Help Me Talk Right books How to Teach a Child to Say the “R” Sound in 15 Easy Lessons, How to Teach a Child to Say the “S” Sound in 15 Easy Lessons and How to Teach a Child to Say the “L” Sound in 15 Easy Lessons and Preschool Stuttering: What Parents Can Do. Ms. Raz is also a contributing author in other publications.
Ms. Raz is a past president of the Phoenix Holocaust Survivors’Association. She is a member of the Board and the Education Chair for the Phoenix Holocaust Association. Ms. Raz newest publication is The Birds Sang Eulogies: A Memoir. The book recounts the harrowing experiences of her parents during WWII as they struggled to survive the Nazi’s attempted extermination of the Jews.
Ms. Raz is married to Zohar Raz. They are the proud parents of two daughters and two grandchildren.
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