I had the privilege and the honor, along with one of my children, of having dinner a week ago with Tova Friedman’s daughter, son in law and grandson. I immediately started reading The Daughter of Auschwitz following our dinner (it was on my Goodreads list). More than 40 years ago, George Clare published his Holocaust memoir, Last Waltz in Vienna, one of the very first of what might be called Shoah-realism.

Tova Friedman was one of the youngest people who survived Auschwitz and one of humanity's greatest tragedies. In this moving and inspirational read she tells of surviving the liquidation of the Jewish ghetto in Central Poland where she lived as a toddler and being sent to a Nazi labour camp at the age of 4 with her parents. She is one of very few Jews that entered a gas chamber but lived to tell the tale! My story is not that unique, except that I survived to tell it. Other children, when they arrived into Auschwitz, were taken straight to the gas chamber. They never had a chance. Nobody had a chance. Somehow I had the chance, so I have to tell it. This was a true story vs. a historical fiction. The author wants to make sure that no one ever forgets what happened during the holocaust, and as human beings, we never should! Tova, ( she changed her name not just from Tola- a name she was born with, but also from the name Susan adoptive family gave her - perhaps out of what they perceived would protect her from being bullied in school -and guess what? From adults too!) Gives us a peek into a world that narrowed and became extremely more difficult each day to survive. There was one sentence that stayed with me throughout the book, a fantastic line that summed up how hopeless and helpless their situation was:

Christmas Gifts

She and her mother had been separated from her father at Auschwitz, not knowing his fate. They left the camp in April 1945. Her mother uttered one word: "Remember." In The Daughter of Auschwitz, Tova immortalizes what she saw, to keep the story of the Holocaust alive, at a time when it's in danger of fading from memory. She has used those memories that have shaped her life to honour the victims. Written with award-winning former war reporter Malcolm Brabant, this is an extremely important book. Brabant's meticulous research has helped Tova recall her experiences in searing detail. Together they have painstakingly recreated Tova's extraordinary story about the world's worst ever crime. SIMON: There's a moment in this extraordinary memoir when you recollect that your father remembered seeing a rabbi at one point.

This is not an easy book to get through, but it is so worthwhile. But one of the things that was hard for me to read, Tova Friedman, was the impossible choices that the Germans imposed on the Jewish people. The decision your mother had to make when there was a point when the Nazis were choosing which families survived and which didn’t, and she had to push away two of your cousins. Her co-author is our very own Malcolm Brabant. And we are just delighted to have them joining us from London. In a powerfully written book, THE DAUGHTER OF AUSCHWITZ (Hanover Square Press 2022), Tova Friedman recounts firsthand experiences of how she struggled to survive the most heinous crime of history, the Holocaust. She chronicles her story of survival, under the direst of circumstances, beginning with the Nazi invasion of Poland until her liberation from Auschwitz.

She and her mother had been separated from her father at Auschwitz, not knowing his fate. They left the camp in April 1945. Her mother uttered one word, “Remember.” Tola Grossman is now Tova Friedman and she’s written a deeply vivid and affecting account of her life then, and since. It’s called The Daughter of Auschwitz: My Story of Resilience, Survival, and Hope. Her co-author is our very own, Malcolm Brabant, and we are just delighted to have them joining us from London. Hello, to both of you, Tova, and to Malcolm. This book came about as a result of Malcolm coming to report on the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, and he was talking to you, Tova, how did this book idea come about? FRIEDMAN: I don't know. I don't know. You know, I don't know the different theories that God didn't do it, that man did it.

FRIEDMAN: He said, remember us. That was the cry for most people who went on the cattle car (ph). They knew they would be exterminated. Darunter über 6 Millionen Juden, die in Ghettos gepfercht wurden, um anschließend in den Vernichtungslagern ermordet zu werden. So, the first thing what he did, though, he made a short program for your — I think for your TV, right? And it was fabulous. I'll let her tell her story and the story of those around her. This is one of the most disturbing stories I've read because it isn't muted through the gauze of being "historical fiction". This is a real person who lived through horrible events. Sadly, this kind of thing isn't over and I'm not sure it will ever be over. The story is beautiful though, hearing Tova Friedman's success in living a full life despite all that happened to her and those around her.So that morning, we got a very special breakfast - something sweet, something warm, something wet. It was like porridge, but it was the best meal I can remember ever in the war. And after we ate, we got dressed, and we walked. And as I'm walking to the crematorium, I hear a voice. It was calling me by my name. And I said, oh, that must be my mother, because there were women standing there.