The fur­ther we get from the Holo­caust, the more the mem­oirs increase. It seems to be an imper­a­tive of descen­dants to keep mem­o­ries of their fam­i­ly con­stant, to not relin­quish these loved and once vibrant peo­ple nor allow the tri­als they expe­ri­enced to dis­ap­pear into the mias­ma. Some mem­oirs exist, there­fore, main­ly to pro­vide con­ti­nu­ity for future gen­er­a­tions or to fur­nish proof of the Shoah. Oth­ers, beau­ti­ful­ly writ­ten, read like fine fic­tion; a few offer insights that are applic­a­ble to the larg­er pop­u­la­tion, uncov­er­ing a new phe­nom­e­non as a result of the writer’s inves­ti­ga­tion; still oth­ers are intend­ed to teach as well as to remember…”in sun­shine and in shad­ow.”

The Roth­mans and the Burg­ers had lived hap­pi­ly, pro­duc­tive­ly, and com­fort­ably in Uzhorod, a small town in the Karpathi­an Moun­tains, for five gen­er­a­tions. After the Nazi incur­sion and increas­ing harass­ment, they began their flight, hid­ing with rel­a­tives, in attics, and cel­lars, until they were caught and impris­oned sep­a­rate­ly. Ulti­mate­ly they reached Budapest and were saved by Raoul Wal­len­berg. Dr. Good­kin is a Holo­caust speak­er for all lev­els of schools from ele­men­tary to col­lege. In addi­tion to recount­ing her sto­ry, she stress­es to the stu­dents that ​“the Holo­caust is not just past his­to­ry. Eth­nic cleans­ing is all around us — the tor­ture, suf­fer­ing of inno­cents in the name of racial, reli­gious, or eth­nic puri­ty.” Con­tin­u­ing in this vein she enjoins stu­dents ​“to remem­ber the lessons of the Holo­caust and work hard to keep it from happening…You cer­tain­ly have your work cut out for you.” This well writ­ten, straight­for­ward his­to­ry of the author and her family’s life dur­ing the Holo­caust years cul­mi­nates with a descrip­tion the many speak­ing engage­ments and teach­ing meth­ods she employs and the work of the Holo­caust Cen­ter of the Richard Stock­ton Col­lege.