Ninette's War
John Jay
Sachbuch / Biographien, Autobiographien
Beschreibung
THE TIMES NON-FICTION RECOMMENDED READ
'Chillingly relevant' DAILY MAIL
'Evocative, assiduously researched ... one girl's wartime escape [and] a brutal reckoning with Vichy France's wilful complicity in wartime atrocities' SUNDAY TIMES
'A deeply researched and evocative true story' ANNE SEBBA
Ninette Dreyfus was a cosseted scion of one of France's most prominent Jewish families - a cousin to Albert Einstein and family friend to Colette. But when the Second World War broke out and the Germans occupied Paris, the fall was dramatic. Realising that her fate would be transformed, the teenager soon found herself fleeing the capital for the South, only to then fall prey to the Vichy regime. In fear for her life at the hands of the Nazis and their French collaborators, she became somebody else.
Woven together from Ninette's own diaries and interviews with author John Jay before she died, NINETTE'S WAR traces the frailty of national and personal unity through the eyes of a young woman, in compelling and unforgettable detail.
Rezensionen
An <b>evocative, assiduously researched account of survival, </b> <b>[and] brutal reckoning with Vichy France'
A pacey and well-researched from an impressive array of sources, <i> Facing Fearful Odds</i> is <b>a moving testament to filial love</b>. Jay has the journalists gift for moving a narrative along in a pacey fashion, and <b>takes us to the heart of darkness where so many men like his father had to dwell</b>, giving him a voice through this work of love
This book is a <b>well-written and moving act of filial homage</b>, where Jay discusses a father always beyond his reach ... leaving behind little more than a few pages of an abandoned memoir and book of poems, <b><i>Facing Fearful Odds</i> explores the mystery</b> and tries to make sense of his father'
A coming-of-age story that unravels France'
Ninette Dreyfus was from a prominent Jewish family, who had lived in France for generations. <b>This is her story of fleeing the country in wartime</b>
Jay has done an <b>expert job, not just of telling the story of the Dreyfus family, but also the shocking progression of France</b>, from the first European country to emancipate Jews, to a place where French people denounced, betrayed and helped to murder them ... some believed that [their secular-mindedness] would save them, even after the Nazis occupied France. <i>Ninette's</i> <i>War</i> is as much <b>a dissection of the tragic failure of that belief, as it is a family'
A <b>fascinating</b> account of life in a prisoner-of-war camp ... <i>Facing Fearful Odds</i> is <b>remarkable reconstruction of one man'
<b>Chronicling</b> <b> the harrowing story of her family's wartime experience</b> and their dizzying fall from extreme wealth and privilege to homelessness, fear and hunger, <b>Jay skilfully weaves extracts from Ninette's diary </b> <b>into a wider account</b> of what happened to French Jews. In between typical teenage musings on clothes, spots and crushes on boys, <i>Ninette'
<b>Praise for <i>Facing Fearful Odds</i></b>
John Jay's riveting account of the life of Ninette Dreyfus, daughter of one branch of the illustrious Jewish family, skillfully unfurls <b>a fascinating, textured account of France's betrayal of the Jews during the Second World War</b>. Cleaving to the details of her life and that of those around her, Jay provides <b>a gripping and fresh narrative of ever-more astonishing, pacey and ultimately world-changing events</b>. At a time when the Holocaust and the taboo against anti-Semitism moves further away in time, <i>Ninette's War</i> provides urgent context and details we must not forget, alongside a compassionate, <b>elegant tribute to one brave woman'
<b>Well written</b> with useful maps and interesting photos ... [will be] of interest to anyone looking for <b>a soldier'
A <b>vivid and engaging</b> description of [Alec Jay'
The ripples of stories about the courage and tragic fate of Jews in Nazi occupied Europe still reach us. John <b>Jay'
Kundenbewertungen
European History, Vichy France, Bart van Es, Jewish Literature, Two Sisters, Debra Barnes The Young Survivors, Holocaust Survivor, Auschwitz Survivor, Alfred Dreyfus, Hadley Freeman, Travellers in the Third Reich, The Boy in Striped Pajamas, Jews Don't Count, World War 2, Holocaust Memoir, Cut Out Girl, House of Glass, Daniel Finkelstein, The Ratline, Antisemitism, Nazi Resistance, Hitler and Me, Holocaust Memorial, Julian Borger, Diary of Anne Frank, Dreyfus affair, Philippe Sands