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Overview
Flip Slier's letters, written to his parents from a forced labor camp in German-occupied Holland, were found in an attic 60 years after World War II. The book captures several months in the lives of a few brave people struggling to survive the Nazi onslaught. It is a lesson in decency and courage. The book's message is that ordinary people can maintain their integrity and act with goodness, even in the face of terror and tragedy. It is a testament to the survivors as well as a memorial to the dead. Flip's story is told through his letters and supplemented by annotations and over 200 historical photos, maps, and documents.Synopsis
Flip Slier's letters, written to his parents from a forced labor camp in German-occupied Holland, were found in an attic 60 years after World War II. The book captures several months in the lives of a few brave people struggling to survive the Nazi onslaught. It is a lesson in decency and courage. The book's message is that ordinary people can maintain their integrity and act with goodness, even in the face of terror and tragedy. It is a testament to the survivors as well as a memorial to the dead. Flip's story is told through his letters and supplemented by annotations and over 200 historical photos, maps, and documents.
Publishers Weekly
Discovered hidden in a bathroom ceiling in Amsterdam in 1997, this collection of letters from Philip "Flip" Slier, a Dutch Jew killed in the Holocaust, displays a spirit as indomitable as that of Anne Frank's. Slier was 18 when he was sent to a Dutch labor camp in April 1942. Described by friends as good-natured and gregarious, he maintained an optimistic air in the letters to his parents, asserting that he and his fellow laborers were better off in the labor camp than at a concentration camp. One also gets the sense that his constant references to food and fun are part of his expressed message to his parents: "Be strong, you hear! Don't despair. I don't either." Deborah Slier, Flip's cousin, and her co-editors add documents, other recollections and a general history of the war, making this book more than the story of one young man, but an addition to the history of the Holocaust in Holland that could be particularly effective as educational material. Slier escaped from the camp but was rearrested, and as with all Holocaust tales, this one is devastating. Photos. (Oct.)
Copyright 2007 Reed Business InformationEditorials
Publishers Weekly
Discovered hidden in a bathroom ceiling in Amsterdam in 1997, this collection of letters from Philip "Flip" Slier, a Dutch Jew killed in the Holocaust, displays a spirit as indomitable as that of Anne Frank's. Slier was 18 when he was sent to a Dutch labor camp in April 1942. Described by friends as good-natured and gregarious, he maintained an optimistic air in the letters to his parents, asserting that he and his fellow laborers were better off in the labor camp than at a concentration camp. One also gets the sense that his constant references to food and fun are part of his expressed message to his parents: "Be strong, you hear! Don't despair. I don't either." Deborah Slier, Flip's cousin, and her co-editors add documents, other recollections and a general history of the war, making this book more than the story of one young man, but an addition to the history of the Holocaust in Holland that could be particularly effective as educational material. Slier escaped from the camp but was rearrested, and as with all Holocaust tales, this one is devastating. Photos. (Oct.)
Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information