With frightening speed, events prove otherwise. They’ve been slightly worried by the news from Germany, Austria and Czechoslovakia but surely that won’t ever spill over into Poland.
One son is in France working as an engineer but his true passion is composing music.
Grown children are marrying and business is flourishing.
An educated, polished family of professionals, they are well respected in their circles of friends and acquaintances. “A novel” is on the cover but the description tells me it’s “based on a true story.” Frankly I wasn’t sure what to expect and was actually a little nervous after reading the blurb.īeginning in the days just before war is declared, we see most of the Kurc family gathered in their hometown of Radom, Poland. Who is this sophisticated couple and why were they lucky? They appear to be pre-war, maybe European but the misty background looked ominous. The title and cover of this book caught my attention. In a novel of breathtaking sweep and scope that spans five continents and six years and transports readers from the jazz clubs of Paris to Kraków’s most brutal prison to the ports of Northern Africa and the farthest reaches of the Siberian gulag, We Were the Lucky Ones demonstrates how in the face of the twentieth century’s darkest moment, the human spirit can find a way to survive, and even triumph. Driven by an unwavering will to survive and by the fear that they may never see one another again, the Kurcs must rely on hope, ingenuity, and inner strength to persevere. But soon the horrors overtaking Europe will become inescapable and the Kurcs will be flung to the far corners of the world, each desperately trying to navigate his or her own path to safety.Īs one sibling is forced into exile, another attempts to flee the continent, while others struggle to escape certain death, either by working grueling hours on empty stomachs in the factories of the ghetto or by hiding as gentiles in plain sight. The talk around the family Seder table is of new babies and budding romance, not of the increasing hardships threatening Jews in their hometown of Radom, Poland. It is the spring of 1939 and three generations of the Kurc family are doing their best to live normal lives, even as the shadow of war grows closer.
Jayne B Reviews / Book Reviews family relationships / Historical / Jewish characters / Jewish-faith / Poland / war / World War II Comments Off on REVIEW: We Were the Lucky Ones by Georgia HunterĪn extraordinary, propulsive novel based on the true story of a family of Polish Jews who are separated at the start of the Second World War, determined to survive-and to reunite FebruREVIEW: We Were the Lucky Ones by Georgia Hunter
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