"The Good Old Days": The Holocaust as Seen by Its Perpetrators and Bystanders

by Ernst Klee (Editor), Willi Dressen (Editor), Volker Riess (Editor)

The title "The Good Old Days" ("Schone Zeiten" in German) comes from the cover of a private photo album kept by concentration camp commandant Kurt Franz of Treblinka. This gruesomely sentimental and unmistakably authentic title introduces an disturbing collection of photographs, diaries, letters home, and confidential reports created by the executioners and sympathetic observers of the Holocaust. "The Good Old Days" reveals startling new evidence of the inhumanity of recent twentieth century history and is published now as yet another irrefutable response to the revisionist historians who claim to doubt the historic truth of the Holocaust.

Genres: History, Holocaust, Nonfiction, World War II, War, European History, Politics

256 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1988

About the author

Ernst Klee (1942 - 2013) was a German journalist and author.

As a writer on Germany's history, he was best known for his exposure and documentation of the medical crimes of Adolf Hitler's Third Reich, much of which was concerned with the involuntary euthanasia program.

Reviews

[Henry · Rating 3 out of 5]

Holocaust literature keeps moving on.
At first, there was a flood of survivor memoirs, and some continue today (especially self-published books as the aging survivors want to leave a legacy before they die). The trend in recent years is well illustrated by this title, a closer look at the perpetrators; it answers the question "How could anyone do such things?"
One of the earliest efforts was included in "Human Behavior in the Concentration Camp," (1953), a combination memoir and essay by a well-known survivor, Dr. Elie Cohen. While concentrating on the prisoners under death-sentence, there is an insightful chapter included, "The Psychology of the SS." This chapter, perhaps, marks the beginning of this genre.
Other publications (including "Ordinary Men" (1992), and "Hitler's Willing Executioners" (1996)) looked at sociological source material to understand the psychology and social background of the men who had to "pull the trigger" so to speak, in order for millions to be murdered in such a short time.
Here, the editors ferret out eyewitness accounts by the perpetrators, written during and immediately after the War. Here, the perpetrators speak for themselves. The result is some insight into how ordinary citizens -- perhaps you and I under the same circumstances -- could justify being called upon to kill women and children on an assembly line basis.
Written by the killers as they killed, the holocaust is seen "up close and personal," brought down in scale to the reality of one-on-one experiences. Among other things, we learn that the earliest experiments in genocide required executioners to shoot their victims with rifles, one-on-one. Not very effective. We also learn that German soldiers did not face severe consequences if they refused to participate. The careerist would lose his career, of course, but otherwise they were reassigned without prejudice.
How could ordinary people become murderers? It's all in a days work, it seems.

[Edwina Book Anaconda · Rating 5 out of 5]

They said they didn't know what was happening ... they lied.
This book will curdle your blood and make you sick to your stomach.

[Maurizio Manco · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Fra gli ebrei uccisi da me c'era una donna di 20-30 anni, non potrei essere più preciso; era graziosa. [...] Ma, per favore, non credete che ci abbia provato gusto. [...] Quando dovevo fare qualcosa pensavo sempre: fai a una persona il minor male possibile. Volevo far sì che la giovane ebrea non provasse il terrore della morte. Quindi l'ho fatta uscire dalla cantina: lei camminava davanti a me. Lungo il percorso che portava alla fossa, o alle fosse già scavate, le ho sparato improvvisamente alle spalle." - L'SS Heinrich Hesse (cit. a p. 166)

Un gentiluomo, proprio.

[Linda · Rating 4 out of 5]

You've read and heard about the atrocities against the Jews all your life. Book after heart-rending book has been written.

But have you heard the story from the other side? Read this book. I mean read this book. It's fascinating.

Journal extracts, interrogations, memos, personal recollections and other sources of information were collected and edited to allow us to see the German side. It is definitely a MUST read.

This is Arendt's "banality" of evil. Few of the people here are the "monsters" we're told about. Most of them are regular humans, petty, ambitious, loving husbands, loyal, dutiful. And horrid.

In a few instances some glimmer of reason can be seen. It was not true that soldiers were told they had to be on the death squads or they would be killed themselves. An order actually came down from Himmler (actually seen and handled by one of the men in the book) that soldiers were not allowed to be punished for refusing to serve on death squads. They were simply to be assigned to other duties. Several of the witnesses here attest to that because they were re-assigned after requesting release. Now, that doesn't mean that they necessarily thought the action was bad.....

Another crazy case is the case of the Generalkommissar for White Russia, Gauleiter Kube. Kube apparently had a sort of a conscience; not enough to boldly stand up to the Reich, but he did protest the actions of the death squads in his area by writing up a long list of Jews to be excluded because they were necessary for the war effort - craftsmen, their families, Jewish Council members - to the extent that all the Jews in his jurisdiction were included. The death squad did not see the validity of his list and most of the people on it were killed. Kube then sent a letter to the higher-ups, protesting the action - but not in a way that suggested that he was against the killing, but that it had been done in a slipshod manner and had aroused the suspicions of the local White Russians whose trust he had just gained. The next letter claims that Kube was "quite literally slavish" towards the Jews, favoring them at all times. This letter could have been written by a pissed off 5th grader - Everyone knows it!!!!!!!!!!!!

Most of the writers/speakers were not necessarily against the killings - one confesses that he was taken in by the propaganda and I think he is being truthful - but didn't want to do them personally. They saw the Aktion as a necessary part of the war; after all, their Furher said it was. THEY were more concerned with whether they would get leave soon, whether their packages were getting through to their families, whether their mistresses were being true and would accompany them to their posts, etc.

It's mind-boggling. It's unexplainable. But it's totally human. I think you need to read this and ask yourself - would I have been any different?

[Fede · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every earthly power commits atrocities in order to (indeed) become an earthly power. We know a lot about the Cambodian jungle butchery, the Soviet immense killing machine, the Junta's helicopters, the Klan's lynchings; even the Bible provides several historically reliable accounts of Hebrew, Canaanite, Assyrian, Babylonian, Macedonian and Roman mass murders.
So, the question is: what is it that still makes the Nazi crimes so outstanding? What's so peculiar about them? What makes them so morbid that a whole branch of pornography is based on their imagery? Why are we still horrified watching photographs of Birkenau C or the Dachau labs?

It's their obscenity. It's the obscene nature of their ideation, execution, representation. An impeccable beaurocratic structure that went hand in hand with the filth and perversity of the actual practice: a cesspool of sex, destruction, well-groomed psychopaths and stench of corpses that starts haunting your mind the moment you open this book. It's homosexual deputy commander Kurt Franz, aka The Doll; it's Barry the Dog, trained to bite off the genitals of Treblinka prisoners ("Man, bite the dog!"); it's Kurt Bolender, another Kurt, this one jogging bare-chested along the fence of Sobibor camp and smashing children's heads; it's the Death Dealer of Kaunas and the guy who had women stripped naked and killed in order to take pornographic pictures. It's a lot of things that happened because one no longer knew how to stop the game once it had started; because one no longer knew why the game should stop in the first place.

This is the best book I've ever read about the holocaust, probably because it's the most explicit, but also because the viewpoint here is not that of the victims: in fact only the perpetrators speak. To us, to each other and, to a certain degree, to themselves.
This essay is a collection of interviews, diary entries, private and official letters (to headquarters, offices, superiors, colleagues, wives, lovers), leaflets, logs and photographs. The photos in in particular, you won't find them anywhere else: grainy, horrible, often taken by a hasty or clumsy hand. Such visual and written material provides the reader with plenty of information about those aspects of the genocide of the Jewish populations in Poland, White Russia and the Baltic area that are reluctantly dealt with or utterly ignored, such as the people's zeal in rounding up the Jews and the possibility for the regular troops to either join in the firing squads or be given other assignments (nobody wanted a soldier to have a nervous breakdown and machine-gun the whole company), or the role played by the locals, who were often all too glad to loot the ghettos, houses and corpses left behind by the Germans; not to mention the army's lower ranks, who would later try to blame the massacres on the Einsatzgruppen alone (their task being the destruction of the Jewish minorities in the occupied territories): actually, the Wehrmacht took care of the logistics of most operations and therefore provided the SS with all the required vehicles, weapons, food supply and, if needed, manpower.

One of the chapters is about the gassing vans, which were the prototype of the largest gas chambers to be set up in the camps; in fact, truck engines were used in Chelmno, Treblinka, Belzec and Sobibor, where the Jews were locked up in small rooms saturated with carbon monoxide. Forget about fake showers and zyklon B: it was all down-to-earth over there, and much more effective.
However, the scariest parts are the private letters and journal entries. SS bitching about petty rivalries, sending food and toys home, asking about the children, dreaming of their lovers, casually mentioning a thousand Jews that had just been shot and buried or were still waiting to be disposed of in order to fulfill a commander's assigned quota. It's like, "I love you, darling. I'm so tired tonight, what with those goddamn Ukrainians and the 1634 Jews we still have to get rid of, most of whom are women and children and therefore totally useless. God, I miss you so much. I can't wait to see you again, you sexy kitten - by the way, do you like goose meat? An old lady here brought me a big fat one and gave me a special recipe. Yum! Already licking my fingers. Going to bed now... kisses, H."
(It's even worse than I make it sound. In fact I'm making it sound more like myself)

Babi Yar, Kaunas, Rostov, Radom and the cities of the General Government; these documents take the reader on a journey through the hell of the early 40s, when the Nazi Empire was at the height of its grandeur. Anyway, few of these men were even remotely concerned with politics, war, ideology. They were bored to tears, devoured by ambition, stuck in some godforsaken wasteland, embittered by years of rivalry or simply carrying on through the war without giving a shit about anything. One of the most iconic figures is that of a doctor in Auschwitz whose diary is but a long series of complaints about the quality of the canteen food. He reminded me of Irma Grese's obsession with expensive perfume and Olympia rolls.

If you're interested in the Holocaust from a historical and not merely literary point of view, read this book. It's unique, there's nothing like this out there.

See also Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka: The Operation Reinhard Death Camps

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thoroughly terrifying.

As I read this, I was forced to ask myself what I might have done if I'd been there. That seemed like an easy question to answer before but when the darkest, most vicious instincts of mankind are laid bare, as they are in this account, it no longer seems so simple.

While many of the perpetrators (perhaps ALL of the ringleaders) one encounters in The Good Old Days are clearly monstrous from the outset, waiting only for an opportunuty to unleash their basest natures on their innocent victims, many otherwise kind people, "normal" people, descended into brutality, rage, and madness. They committed outrageous crimes of which they would not otherwise have been capable and then gloated over their deeds in the diaries and letters of which this book is composed.

A rational modern reader must ask herself, "What might my diary have looked like?"

[Kevin Revolinski · Rating 5 out of 5]

Harrowing. not only do you get the banality of evil from all these personal accounts, court records, and letters home, but you also get a wider picture of the people involved. Lithuanian villagers, for example, who massacred their local Jews while the Nazis were told to stand back in merely watch. the hatred was widespread. you occasionally get the account of the German soldier who is absolutely horrified and traumatized by what he witnessed or even took part in. but you also come to understand that there was no threat of severe punishment to soldiers who refused to participate. sure, it might have affected their career or made them the target of accusations of cowardice, but in no way did they risk being corporally punished or demoted. it's horrifying to see how easily ordinary people can be moved to commit atrocities and how sadistic sick people can find a place to be considered "normal" and be rewarded for their atrocities. and good lord, the clear relevance to politics before, since, and currently.

[Bruce · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like the review on the dust cover states “This is a horrible book to read, and yet one that should be read-“
It is truly horrible. It is dark, disturbing, troubling and enraging. The callous accounts of those who had committed the atrocities of the “Final Solution” and then unflinchingly speak of trivial matters such as the excellent supper at the officers mess shows the very darkest side of humanity. It bares witness to those who refused to complete these orders but also states there was no real punishment for refusing nor were they opposed to what was happening.
It also casts light on the participation of the atrocities committed by nations or ethnic groups which are not generally associated with the Holocaust.
It is an important book to read if a person can stomach it as it illustrates how a civilized nation can very quickly spiral into absolute barbarism.

[Gijs Limonard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Refreshing and stultifyingly icy vantage point on the holocaust; from the man operating the tank engine in Treblinka, providing the carbon monoxide filling up the gas chambres, to testimonies from members of the Einsatz Gruppen executing the 'holocaust by bullets' in the newly conquered eastern European plane, to the camp kommandant of Auschwitz; all have their unfiltered say.

[Deb Barnes]

This was a really distressing book to read, but served for me as a harrowing reminder that genocide doesn't happen out of nowhere. It is enabled by a platform of indifference, covert racism and bias. It prompted me to reflect on ways I might be complicit in the Australian context in allowing such platforms to exist, and that no level of racism or implicit bias is ok.

[Susan Sample · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an edited work of primary documents by and about perpetrators (and a few bystanders) of the Holocaust. There is some post-war legal testimony and interrogation, but a great deal of the book is composed of letters, diaries, and action reports made at the time. The editors have some particular goals here--the book has a small section toward the end on the death camps, but much of it covers the slaughter of Eastern European/Russian Jewry by the Einsatzgruppen. While they kept some statistics (one unrelenting report listing mass killings and the numbers of victims going on for pages and pages is included), in truth we have never known precisely how many people were killed by these mobile shooting teams. Nuremberg prosecutor Benjamin Firencz found clear evidence for at least one million after the war, but he was estimating conservatively. Entry after entry here makes it clear that men participated in the carnage even though they could easily enough get out of it with no negative ramifications. The editors want it very clear that the "I had to do it or they would have killed me" argument is bunk. These were choices made by the perpetrators, and they were evil choices. There is evidence here of the Wehrmacht's ambivalent attitude (and sometimes clear disapproval) toward the mass killing, and there is clear evidence of the fact that the regime did not want people in Germany knowing the details of what was happening (it was public dismay that had forced an end to the program to kill the handicapped and mentally ill) in the East. It was a badly kept secret given all of these letters and the (illegal) photographs many of the men kept taking of victims. In the end, the government had whole details of men digging up the hundreds (or thousands) of mass graves and burning the bodies with the stated purpose of making it impossible in the future to truly know how many people were murdered. The entries here personify the banality of evil, and the collection is sickening. I felt while reading it that I owed the editors, and certainly the translator, a debt for spending so much time with these horrible, horrible documents to preserve them, to make them known, so that denial would be even more obviously vile.

[Dachokie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Casual Killing …

Ernst Klee’s THE GOOD OLD DAYS differs from most books on the Holocaust in that rather than writing a historical perspective, he provides damning evidence of the extent of German involvement in mass murder.

THE GOOD OLD DAYS is mostly a collection of correspondence, testimony and other documents from those who witnessed, facilitated, ordered and/or participated in the murder of Jews on the Eastern Front. While names like Mengele, Himmler and Heydrich are innately associated with the Holocuast, they aren’t among the cast of characters in this book. Klee reveals that “ordinary” Germans on the Eastern Front were well aware of the systematic slaughter of innocents and witnessed numerous “killing events” first hand. Cooks, orderlies and Wehrmacht enlisted men reveal, in chilling clarity, the casual nature of the killing … even the killing of children. While history has shown that simply “following orders” has been the trademark rationale for those accused of such crimes, Klee’s book provides evidence of the willingness to ignore events, if not participate in them (directly or indirectly). The accounts are disturbing in that many of the happenings detailed are small-scale (when compared to Babi Yar or Auschwitz), but frequent and extremely brutal in nature … the murders happened as opportunities presented themselves … anywhere, at any time and by any means. Many of the numerous photos throughout the book serve as visual evidence that supports the specific events being described.

I’ve read numerous books on the subject matter, but THE GOOD OLD DAYS really hit a nerve in that it documents the role of “ordinary Germans” in the Holocaust and casts doubt over the over-claimed innocence of the “average” German soldier. This book proved to be a sad and disturbing read, but it provides a perspective of events that is seldom seen … that of the perpetrator. I found it somewhat ironic that, as I was reading this book, the eerie news of ISIS brutality in the Middle East started to dominate the news. Once again, the world is watching (immediately and with vivid clarity thanks to YouTube, Twitter and Instagram) innocents being slaughtered by those worshiping a cancerous ideology … and doing nothing about it.

[Vera · Rating 5 out of 5]

One the most interesting books about Holocaust. The times of horror seeing by Perpetrators as The Good Old Days. Taking "samples" of body parts of living humans, like if they are just a laboratory animals, killing them with injection. But taking good care about they animals and about the families at home. Nothing can make you understand more the evil idea of Holocaust. I find this book again on my shelf by reading a short article about one 95 years old man, who will stand a trail in Germany for his participation in killing in Auschwitz. Late punishment. He will have a doctor care thru whole trail. It is more symbolic , then real. But it is interesting.

[Fishface · Rating 2 out of 5]

This one was too disjointed to finish. It read like a stack of index cards filled with bite-sized ideas that might one day become a book -- raggedy and still disassembled.

[Peter Stuart · Rating 3 out of 5]

Honestly, I have had an eye out for this book for years. I say an eye out as having learned of it I put in on my reading list and sought it out without actively tracking it down. In seeking several things of interest became apparent. It is not a work that is held by any public institution, library, research center or museum, that I could easily find in Victoria, Australia. This I found “interesting”.

Seeking also established that there were VERY few copies available for sale in Australia, and this that were, were excessively priced and to be found within specialist retailers of whom all but one were on line. So, no public copies, niece retailers and excessively priced. This added to “interesting”.

So, when purchasing a few other works from a US based website, I thought I’d see if this was available at a reasonable price and I ended up with a copy. Hence via a long journey, I came to read the work. So, without significant spoilers…..

There can be little doubt that horrific events occur both in times of war and in peace as a matter of political stance, purpose or policy.

Indeed, much has been written of the barbaric, horrific and obscene instances that occurred immediately preceding, during and for a period after World War Two. The United Kingdom’s pillaging of natural resources, but more significantly food stuffs from pre partition India tha resulted in the deprivation of millions and the starvation of hundreds of thousands. The Soviet Union’s treatment of German prisoners of war that resulted in 1 in 10 returning to Germany as last as the mid 1950’s. The Imperial Japanese Army’s covert Kamo Detachment and Ishii Unit who conducted prolonged biological and chemical warfare research and development that undertook lethal human experimentation on untold numbers of people.

Likewise, the Imperial Japans extensive use forced labor units of indigenous peoples and prisoners of war throughout Asia that killed many hundreds or thousands, if not millions. In similar veins, the German use of indentured/slave labor from occupied countries and Soviet prisoners of war. Yet, most numerous of all, volumes upon volumes have been written about the deliberate extermination polices perpetrated by the Nazi regime against their own weak, infirm, mental ill, political opposition, ethnic minorities, inclusive of the Romany’s (by example), prisoners of war and peoples of the Jewish faith.

Especially of the Jewish faith.

This work adds to the immense volume of documentation, evidence, Jewish experience and diverse and multi sourced opinions and actions of the later, founded by the government policies and laws of mid 1930's Germany. Yet it does so from a slightly different angle, as it uses diary entries, extracts of German military and paramilitary reports and components of letters of some of the German personnel engaged in the Eastern European theatre of operations.

To this reader therefore, it was a new approach to that of an extensive array works previously read.

Without specific spoilers however, in general I found the work to be a disappointment. I had no interest in reading about accommodation standards, what people ate or of the internal politics and positioning that happens within any group of people. Perhaps I was expecting more insight, or more consistent insight, into the minds of those who were there. Into the minds and motivations of those who were engaged in actions. Who perpetrated the outcomes.

Some components of the work may go against general understanding of actions that are “known” about the period of the German occupation of Eastern European lands. This I saw as a important, as it provides insights into what was actual, as opposed to imagined or told after the facts. Indeed, some components of the work may create an interest to seek additional information. Again I see this as a positive. Likewise, the lack of some components may also create an interest to seek other sources as they are seen as “missing” from a pre-perceived expectation, this being slightly harder if the reader has not read much of the documentation on these topics and takes their knowledge from the most common of narratives.

So overall, I will rate this 3 stars, with the perception that it is a work that can potentially add to existing knowledge as opposed as being an introduction to, or part foundation of, a greater understanding of the era, it’s perpetrators or it’s detailed and historically significant outcomes.

It is a work I will now seek to sell on, as opposed to adding it to my library.

[K De · Rating 5 out of 5]

Editors Ernst Klee, Willi Dressen, and Volker Riess have shown the ordinary lives of men who commit acts of mass murder in the name of racist political ideology in their book "The Good Old Days- The Holocaust as Seen By Its Perpetrators and Bystanders". The exculpatory words by these men in the SS unites on the Eastern front shows the lack of morality and willingness to turn a blind eyes to atrocities is not just eye opening but requires a deep examination as to the root causes of why a "Final Solution" was readily embraced by people.

The very words by those people who committed the Shoah shows that a so called "modern" state can be easily manipulated into crimes against humanity. This important work stands out as a easily readable work but requires hard thinking on those men who put to death millions of men, women, and children. There was no consequences of not doing the killings. The editors show that the men faced no retribution for simply saying "No" to be a part of the execution detail of the Einsatzgruppen and police units operating in the rear areas of the conquered territories of the Wehrmacht Army Groups.

The last section of the book is on the extermination camps and the soldiers and doctors who were at Sobibor and Belzac as well as the camp Kulmhof. The men write of their experiences in a manner that does affect them but they still continue to do "the work" of dropping Zyklon-B into the gas chambers as they comment on the "excellent" food in the officers commissary at Auschwitz.

There is no conclusions by the editors but there has to be none. The writings of the operators of the killings in the "Final Solution" program is enough. This is a seminal work that should be read by all because it continues to happen in many places throughout the world since than. The continued mass killings for political, social, and/or religious ideology has not stopped simply because the Neuremberg trials by the International Military Tribuanl after World War Two.

[Kelly Stine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Difficult to read thru, but interesting to read the words written by the Nazis and to see the Holocaust and WWII from the viewpoint of the enemy.

This was not an easy book to read, and I just couldn't just read thru it - I had to take breaks from it, just because reading sections that were either reports of one Nazi to his superior reporting the execution of all the Jews in a town and how many been executed in each town; or the diary entries of some low ranked soldier, about what was happening on the Nazi side of WWII and the executions of the Jews, while he also worried if his girlfriend would wait for him, etc; or letters of a soldier written to his wife and family -well it just could not be read in just one or two days. Frankly, it was a little rough to stomach. Don't get me wrong, it was very interesting or eye opening to read the words of the different Germans (yes, translated to English) but, reading them while already knowing the history of the Holocaust and WWII, it was just difficult to stomach some times. Also there were many graphic pictures -naked Jewish women standing out side in the cold, waiting for their turn to be executed or the pictures of ditches filled with naked bodies, etc.

I originally bought this book when I was a member of the History Book Club, and it has traveled with me and my "library" for many years. Several times I had started to read it, but just couldn't get into it - I guess I just had to wait until I was in the right mood to read it, but after reading a section I would need to take a break from it - watch comedy or John Wayne movies - before I could read the next Chapter a week or so later. Some chapters just left me crying.

[Ray Dunsmore · Rating 3 out of 5]

A chillingly necessary compendium of the banalities of evil. The most striking passages are those in which the mass execution of innocent peoples is described offhandedly with bureaucratic terms like "liquidation" or "alleviation". Even more disturbing are the diaries in which mass executions are mentioned briefly, but the evident unsettling nature of these actions didn't seem to weigh too heavily on their minds, as their thoughts quickly stray to long-distance lovers or the latest films. An important book and a necessary lesson: this could happen to you and, if it did, a lot of people out there wouldn't bat an eye.

[Armin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hervorragende Quellensammlung zur Massenvernichtung der Juden ihren Begleiterscheinungen, was sonst eher auszugsweise zitiert wird, kommt hier als geballte Ladung voll unfassbarer Vorgänge, die ebenso viel von der Überforderung der Massenmörder im organisatorischen Bereich erzählen wie von ihrer Grausamkeit.

[Lawrence]

This is the type of book that cannot be rated - hence no rating. It is not prose created by a writer. It is a compilation of interviews, letters, and documents assembled by the authors to give the reader the first hand perspective from those involved on the front lines of this terrible series of events. There is nothing else to say.

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is unique in the fact that it chronicles the atrocities of the WWII German concentration camps through the words of those that actually participated in those events. It is a great study in the thoughts and beliefs of those that either committed or participated in these events.

[Brett Bosley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Excellent primary source. Horrific content, firsthand accounts of genocide. Nightmare fuel. Lots of evidence of postwar lying by the perpetrators. Only criticism is the editor could have provided more context in places.

[Sam Brown · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely required reading. You won't find any levity in this. Never read anything so boldfaced, simple and hard to contemplate: the pure mechanics of it all. Read in Exeter on a bad day.

[Michael Belcher · Rating 3 out of 5]

Frightening in its depiction of German brutality and banality conducting genocide during World War II.

[Sabrina Vieira · Rating 1 out of 5]

Difficult read

[Adam M. · Rating 5 out of 5]

As per the back of the book:"This is a horrible book to read, and yet one that should be read..."

[Elias · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not a fun read, but an important one.

[Richard Smith · Rating 1 out of 5]

Dry and boring.DNF

[Edward Janes · Rating 5 out of 5]

Incredible resource. Painful material.

[Catherine]

Horrifying. The things humans can inflict on other humans is beyond comprehension to me. This book very starkly lays out how many people participated in the horrors of the Holocaust.