The Girl Who Survived Auschwitz

by Eti Elboim, Sara Leibovits, Esther Frumkin (Translator)

Overview

Poland, 1944The train slowed and halted with a squeal of the breaks. It felt like we waited in the carriage for an eternity, but eventually, the heavy doors opened, directly into the chaos inside.

Sara Leibovitz, a 16-year-old Jewish girl, was a passenger on the train with her family. They spent their final moments together on the platform in Auschwitz before their horrific fates were sealed. Sara’s mother and baby brothers were sent straight to their deaths. Her father was made to work in the Sonderkommando as one of the men forced to remove the bodies from the gas chambers, and was later executed. Sara survived.

This is the powerful true story of Sara Leibovits and the incredible pain and hardships she went through during her time in the death camp. Yet despite the horrors she faced, she always tried to maintain her family’s values of courage, faith and kindness to others. In this compelling memoir, Sara’s story is intertwined with that of her daughter, Eti. Seventy years after the horrors of the Holocaust, Eti reveals the inherited trauma of the second generation and completes the Holocaust survivor’s tale.

The Girl Who Survived Auschwitz:

‘Let us never stop reading these novels. These memoirs are the ones that keep all the voices alive’

‘Highly recommend… I finished reading it with a newfound sense of love and compassion’

‘Reading this family’s memories is a rewarding experience in that it will ensure future generations will remember and learn. Many thanks to the author…for the trust in allowing me to review this life-changing memoir.’

‘A raw and gripping Holocaust recount’

‘What I loved most about this book is that it is a dual perspective…I was grateful to have a little glimpse into the mind of Eti and her absolute respect for her parents…together they learned, they grieved and they healed’

‘It makes me really proud of my Jewish heritage and this story of perseverance. I highly recommend this book for any and all to read so we can keep survivor's stories alive and never let this type of tragedy happen again’

‘Powerful, heartbreaking and inspiring. We need to know what happened. It will make your heart break. It is beyond horrific. But we need to know in memory of the six million innocents who died and of those who survived’

‘A haunting and beautiful read…I give it a resounding 5 stars’

‘We have the perspective of a woman who survived the holocaust as well as her daughter who had never known the horrrors her mother endured, yet asked…I feel honored to have read this memoir’

‘Anyone who reads this book will not be left untouched…truly moving'

‘This is one of those books everyone should read'

‘Remarkable… a profoundly impactful book, one which should be required reading for everyone'

'Sara Leibovits is an amazing lady. She showed strength of character, resilience and maintained a kind heart, as she shared what little she had with those around her in Auschwitz'

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780008600273
Publisher:	HarperCollins Publishers
Publication date:	09/19/2023
Sold by:	HarperCollins Publishers
Format:	eBook
Pages:	336
Sales rank:	57,948
File size:	667 KB

About the Author

Eti Elboim is Sara Leibovitz’s youngest daughter and a writer, journalist, and playwright. As a second-generation Holocaust survivor, she completed a "Memorial Envoys" course from the Shem Olam Institute and became an advocate of her mother's story.

Editorial Reviews

2023-07-07
A Holocaust survivor memoir combined with a daughter’s intimate account of generational trauma.

Leibovits (b. 1928) survived Auschwitz in the final year of the war. In this chilling tale, her daughter, Elboim, narrates her mother’s story and relates how she grew up in Israel under the shadow of a destroyed family. From a tiny community in Czechoslovakia that was annexed by Hungary just before World War II, Leibovits, nee Suri Hershkovits, was 15 when she and her family were rounded up and taken by cattle car to Auschwitz in the spring of 1944. Because it was late in the war, the gruesome gears of extermination were churning, and her mother and brothers were immediately sent to the gas chambers, while her father became a Sonderkommando, chosen to dispose of bodies from the crematorium (he was executed a few months later). Along with several of her compatriots, Leibovits endured unimaginable conditions of grueling labor, “unbearable hunger,” horrendous hygiene, and subsequent ill health. She was able to see her father several times through barbed-wire fences, and he told her to eat everything (kosher or not) to survive. He also sent her notes and small things like makeup, which confounded the girls at first until they realized it helped them look healthier, possibly saving them from being selected for death. Leibovits and Elboim describe these details with intentional specificity as a testament and record for future generations. Interspersed throughout are the poignant, often heartbreaking reflections of Elboim, who expresses the deep sorrow she had to embrace as a child of her haunted mother. “I suppose that every Holocaust survivor is like a charred log that will never really stop burning,” she writes. “But every survivor had his or her own fate, during the Holocaust and afterwards, and no survivor is like any other.”

A moving account that concludes with a sense of triumph over evil and darkness.

Kirkus Reviews