Tag: Auschwitz-Birkenau

Monthly TBR – December 2024

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Today’s post is my last monthly TBR of the year, so I want to make it great! Rather than quantity, my focus is to enjoy some great quality books to round up a fun year.

There is no way I’m going to be able to meet my 2024 reading goals with what I pick up in December. I’m just too far behind. However, although I am behind on them all, I am ‘proportionately’ behind based on the amount of books I’ve read this year. I’ve been reading the right amount of non-fiction and finishing series to meet my goals were I nearer to my overall goal reading 60 books this year.

However, I’m not. I’m also not going to tailor this reading list to try and get those smaller targets either. It’s more important that I enjoy what I’m reading and the books I share in today’s post reflect that. Two of the books I feature on today’s list are also quite chunky.

Let’s take a look!

 

Fixed Reads

The Eye of the World

I’ll start off this list by covering my two ongoing reads as of drafting this post.

The Eye of the World is carried forward from November, but I’ve already made a good amount of progress in the book so far. As of drafting this post, I have another 420 odd pages to read to get to the end of the book. That’s not an insignificant amount as it is, but I’m already a good 350 pages into the story. Events of the book are well underway and I’m pretty immersed in what’s going on.

I’m hopeful to keep up progress with this book and be able to complete by the end of the year!

 

Three Sisters

My second ongoing read, or listen, is Three Sisters by Heather Morris.

I’m really enjoying this third instalment of The Tattooist of Auschwitz series. I love how the characters in prior books tie together. Not only are we seeing characters from the previous books pop into the narratives of the later ones, but I suspect one of the main characters in this book was also in the earlier ones – we just didn’t know it yet.

As this is a kind of narrative I’m really on board with, I’m finding listening to the audiobook quite easy. I’ve been lucky in that in the last few evenings I’ve been able to squeeze in some listening alongside other hobbies. I’ve only got 7 hours of audio left – I don’t think it’ll be long before I share completion!

 

Mood Reads

The Woman Who Would Be King

I debated what to pick up for this next choice. Originally I was in the mindset for a Greek retelling. However, when looking through my reading list to find one I stumbled upon The Woman Who Would Be King and set my heart on that instead.

The Woman Who Would Be King is a biography of a little known female Egyptian pharaoh. What intrigues me about her story is that a lot of her records in history has been destroyed despite being a successful pharaoh by all accounts. Why would a society who benefited and supported her 20+ year rule at the time then want to scratch her from the record? She is little known to me as a result and so I wanted to read about her.

I’ve also enjoyed narratives (both books and TV) about Cleopatra before, so I have every confidence that I’m going to enjoy reading the short biography.

 

The Priory of the Orange Tree

Given that I’ve got some time off coming later this month, I want to take advantage and pick up a chunky audiobook. The Priory of the Orange Tree in print format is around 850 pages. In audio terms, that translates to 26 hours. I have a lot of listening to do…

Honestly, I half expect this to run over into January’s monthly TBR, but that’s okay. It’s been a while since I’ve listened to a fantasy on audio. Especially with one so large, my only slight concern is that there is going to be a lot of detail in here for me to follow. That’s not entirely a bad thing, but in the past I’ve struggled to do this with audio and I’m far better at following what’s going on when reading. I can only see how it goes!

I’m also looking forward to trying Samantha Shannon‘s writing. I’ve had the audio of The Priory of the Orange Tree since 2019, so it’s about time I got to it, right? If it’s good, I’ve already got A Day of Fallen Night to listen to and I’m intrigued by The Bone Season.

 

Summary

Fingers crossed I’m not pushing myself too much for December, because that’s not my goal! I’m mixing up book lengths and formats to make this monthly TBR as approachable as I can with the time I have available in the month.

Thanks for reading this Monthly TBR post! What is your next read? Do you read seasonally for the festive season?

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Shelf Control #73 – 12/01/2024

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Happy Friday and welcome to today’s instalment of my regular Shelf Control feature!

Shelf Control is a regular feature on my blog – a meme run by Lisa at Bookshelf Fantasies. It’s a celebration of the unread books on our shelves! The idea is to pick a book you own but haven’t read and write a post about it (suggestions: include what it’s about, why you want to read it, and when you got it), and link up!

If you want to read more about the Shelf Control feature, check out Lisa’s introductory post.

Today’s book is a historical non-fiction about a topic I am morbidly obsessed with – the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp. More specifically, the experiences of those who lived and suffered there. Today’s feature is a collective of over 100 interviews from those who experienced the camp first-hand. Their unique insight into the inner workings should make for compelling, if equally horrific, reading!

 

Auschwitz – Laurence Rees

Genre: Non-fiction / History

Pages: 327

Audience: Adult

Publisher: Public Affairs

Publication Date: 01 Jan 2005

 

 

Goodreads – Auschwitz

Auschwitz-Birkenau is the site of the largest mass murder in human history. Yet its story is not fully known. In Auschwitz, Laurence Rees reveals new insights from more than 100 original interviews with Auschwitz survivors and Nazi perpetrators who speak on the record for the first time. Their testimonies provide a portrait of the inner workings of the camp in unrivalled detail—from the techniques of mass murder, to the politics and gossip mill that turned between guards and prisoners, to the on-camp brothel in which the lines between those guards and prisoners became surprisingly blurred.

Rees examines the strategic decisions that led the Nazi leadership to prescribe Auschwitz as its primary site for the extinction of Europe’s Jews—their “Final Solution.” He concludes that many of the horrors that were perpetrated in Auschwitz were driven not just by ideological inevitability but as a “practical” response to a war in the East that had begun to go wrong for Germany. A terrible immoral pragmatism characterizes many of the decisions that determined what happened at Auschwitz. Thus the story of the camp becomes a morality tale, too, in which evil is shown to proceed in a series of deft, almost noiseless incremental steps until it produces the overwhelming horror of the industrial scale slaughter that was inflicted in the gas chambers of Auschwitz.

 

My Thoughts

For reasons I can’t put my finger on, I love reading about the Auschwitz camp. I’m fascinated by the subject and learning what happened to the poor individuals that ever passed through these gates.

I have read both fiction and non-fiction on the subject. If you are more interested in the fiction side of things, then I can recommend The Tattooist of Auschwitz and Cilka’s Journey. Three Sisters is on my TBR. More recently, I read The Boy Who Followed His Father into Auschwitz by Jeremy Dronfield. This is a non-fiction account of a father and son who refuse to be separated and endure together. Theirs is a unique story in that they are the only known pair to have been interred together and survive to tell their shared story.

Anyway, back to the current book of discussion! It’s the multi-perspective aspect of Auschwitz that I am excited for. I’ve read several books from same or limited perspectives in the past – see the above examples. The nature of the book featuring so many different voices and experiences should make for a rounded learning opportunity. As a result, Auschwitz promises detailed insight into the workings of the camp and what life was like there. 

Auschwitz has been on my reading list since 2018. It’s definitely coming up due to be read. What better time than the year I’m continuing with a reading goal of deliberately picking up non-fiction?

Do you enjoy reading about Auschwitz-Birkenau, World War II or similar? Do you have any recommendations for further reading for me to look at?

 

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