The remarkable, true story of a teenage Jewish immigrant turned American combat soldier set during the horrors of World War II.
The remarkable, true story of a teenage Jewish immigrant turned American combat soldier set during the horrors of World War II.
The frantic knocking at the door woke me. I should have gotten out of bed to see who was there, but it was warm under the goose feather quilt and the air was cold on my face. I heard the crackle of straw from the mattress across the room and I turned to see my father rising from his bed. He fumbled in the darkness to find his thick, circle-rimmed glasses, then reached for an overcoat to cover his thin frame. “Mr. Gluck, Mr. Gluck! I have a message!” shouted a voice above the howling wind. My sister Marie, who had been sleeping in the other corner of the room, turned in her bed, too. My father lit the wick of an oil lamp, lowered the glass shade into place and walked hurriedly across the cold dirt floor, our eyes following his shadow. As he opened the door, snowflakes began to blow into the room. My father ushered the man in and quickly closed the door behind him. The yellow flame from the lamp illuminated my father's graying beard, but I strained to see the stranger's face. It was no use. He was bundled up against the winter storm. He pulled off his glove, slightly unbuttoned his jacket, and took a small envelope out from an inner pocket.
“Mr. Schwartz sent me with this message,” he said, handing it to my father. Putting a few coins in the man's hand my father said, “Thank you, and be careful.” With a quick nod the messenger went back out into the snowy night. My father closed the door behind him. We heard a horse whinny as he rode off through the snow. My father set the lamp down onto the old wooden table and sat down.
Only then did he open the envelope. His hands trembled as he silently read the note that was inside.
“What is it, apa?” I asked, now standing next to him. He showed me the message. I immediately recognized the handwriting of our uncle, Márton Schwartz, my mother's brother. “Hermine telephoned. Leave tomorrow.” My heart pounded with happiness and excitement. We were leaving Europe!
Without knowing any of the details, the urgent midnight message told us that my sister Hermine had succeeded in getting the passports, visas, and steamship tickets for the four of us. Finally, after struggling for two years, overcoming one obstacle after another, my sisters Marie and Hermine, my brother Herman, and I were going to join our brother Dezső in America.
In Czechoslovakia, right as the Hungarians are taking power in the region at the dawn of World War II via the Vienna Awards, the Gluck family sends four children to the United States to be with their relatives. This is the biography of Irving Gluck, who was seventeen years old when they left Europe and twenty-one when he returned to fight in the US military as an infantry soldier against the Axis powers.
Sherwin Gluck created an excellent novelization of the events as they were presented in letters, historical documents, and interviews with his father, Irving Gluck. In the interest of historicity, Gluck provides numerous details in every stage to support the narrative. Where applicable, he includes historians’ accounts of the battles, such as at Monte Porchia and Anzio, to show not just Irving Gluck’s perspective, but what was happening in each battle. Jewish traditions are explained in the footnotes for non-Jewish readers as well as a variety of other historical notes for context.
The only critiques are minor and technical in nature. The choice to do flashbacks in italics instead of creating a marker and beginning a new paragraph made the larger flashbacks difficult to read. The choice was not incorrect per se but it does pose an accessibility challenge for some. The play-by-plays included for the battles were interesting and helpful, but likely should have been included as appendices for reference rather than multi-page inserts in the chapters. And finally, the citations of Wikipedia absolutely worked against Gluck here. It obviously took a lot of hard work to turn interviews, letters, and historical documents into this book and all those citations did was undermine that.
Overall, the sheer volume of details and the skill with which Gluck crafts it into an engaging narrative are the strongest parts of the book. It is worth noting that if you are looking for a quick-moving action book, this is not for you. This is history. This is for folks who want details, the mundane and very human moments, the names of everyone who mattered to this one man, and all the chaos of trying to put life together in the aftermath of genocide and frontline warfare. This is, as in the dugout, his cup, carved into which is everything he did, a testament to the fact that he was here.
It was an honor to review this book and to hear this story. May his memory be a blessing.