Reviews tagging 'Hate crime'

The Librarian of Auschwitz by Antonio Iturbe

13 reviews

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 against another edition

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

siobhanlh's review against another edition

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Death of parent, Genocide, Torture, Suicide, Grief, Antisemitism, and Hate crime

asourceoffiction's review against another edition

dark emotional informative sad tense medium-paced

Iturbe says in an afterword to the book that the facts and history are the bricks in his story, and the fiction is the mortar that he uses to hold it all together. I think this is an important distinction from some other fictional Auschwitz stories, which have been found to have more inaccuracies and controversy regarding "sensationalising" people's real stories. That's not to say that keeping the reality alive isn't important (which it so obviously is), but this book handles the information as sensitively as I think it's possible to do with anything that includes fiction.

The idea of using books for a sense of escape or normality even at the very worst moments of humanity is incredibly humbling. And the "living books" on offer come so close to creating beauty in this bleak landscape. That there are more books on offer than the physical ones in Dita's meagre library, thanks to the vivid memories of some of the teachers and their retellings of popular stories. It's astonishing the lengths adults (and older children like Dita) would go to in order to give the younger prisoners opportunities and education.

Of course the emotion is so raw throughout, as the dates and the number of dead are all taken from accurate records. It's a really difficult book but gives as much information as it can about what happened to all of the people mentioned after the events of the story. The biographies at the end are fascinating - in particular it was astonishing to me how long Joseph Mengele was able to evade capture and live a relatively normal life, after the atrocities he committed and oversaw. I think because of all that it's an important book for keeping stories alive for all the victims, whether they survived or not.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical trauma, Death, Death of parent, Antisemitism, Genocide, Xenophobia, Terminal illness, War, Confinement, Religious bigotry, Murder, Hate crime, and Deportation

chronicallyplotting's review against another edition

emotional informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

This book was… It’s hard to put into words how powerful this book and the characters are. Such an amazing story; full of heart ache and truth behind real people who literally survived hell. 
You know a book is amazing when you become invested and feel at times as if you are with the characters. I cried, I found myself gasping when things were revealed, I had to put my cheez-its down because i couldn’t eat while some parts where explained. This is a must read for everyone. History repeats itself, and education is a powerful weapon; the Nazis’ knew this and tried to destroy knowledge and truth. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Antisemitism, Child death, Confinement, Death, Death of parent, Genocide, Gore, Grief, Hate crime, Homophobia, Murder, Physical abuse, Racism, Slavery, Suicide, Torture, Violence, War, and Xenophobia

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

lauramcc7's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful 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? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, War, Racism, Murder, Hate crime, Antisemitism, Excrement, Homophobia, Child death, Death of parent, Death, Cursing, Forced institutionalization, Physical abuse, Xenophobia, and Suicide

delz's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative inspiring sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

It must not be an easy task to write a respectful yet entertaining Holocaust story, but The Librarian of Auschwitz is one such novel. The framework of the story is based on a real Jewish girl, Dita Kraus who was 9 years old when the Nazis started their “final solution.” As a 15 year old, Dita became the Librarian of Auschwitz’s, very secret makeshift library that held 8 books. She was part of a secret school in the only camp that housed children, The Family Camp. It was a “front,” so that if a humanitarian group like the Red Cross were to do inspections the Nazis would show this camp where, they believed they were treating the inmates well. Many times survival was just a matter of chance, but on occasion if you were very clever you could workout a way to survive another day. While people lost faith in god and even their fellow man, someone would come along and surprise Dita in their humanity. This is a powerful story of strength and love, love of family and the power of friendship.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racial slurs, Religious bigotry, Child abuse, Confinement, Genocide, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Antisemitism, Body horror, Death, Forced institutionalization, Medical content, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Death of parent, Excrement, Hate crime, Murder, and War

mjwilliamson's review against another edition

dark emotional informative reflective sad slow-paced

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

4.25

I enjoyed this book, though saying that makes me feel weird. It was very sad and thought provoking. The idea that these were real people, a real place and real stories was probably the most terrifying thing about it all. But that was also what kept me engaged. I needed to know what happened to these people through it all. Their surroundings were so desolate and depressing that it, in a way, made it feel like I needed to protect them. I would highly recommend this book to anyone.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Forced institutionalization, Genocide, Gore, Mental illness, Injury/Injury detail, Terminal illness, Religious bigotry, Suicide, Confinement, Death, Death of parent, Grief, Excrement, Hate crime, Racism, Violence, War, Xenophobia, Antisemitism, Body horror, Chronic illness, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Murder, and Racial slurs

llewellareads's review against another edition

dark reflective sad slow-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Antisemitism, Body horror, Confinement, Death of parent, Death, Genocide, Grief, Homophobia, and Racial slurs

Moderate: Child death, Excrement, Gun violence, Hate crime, Sexual assault, War, Violence, Torture, and Suicide

Minor: Incest, Medical content, Mental illness, Ableism, and Pregnancy