Adolfo Kaminsky, une vie de faussaire

by Sarah Kaminsky

« Rester éveillé. Le plus longtemps possible. Lutter contre le sommeil. Le calcul est simple. En une heure, je fabrique trente faux papiers. Si je dors une heure, trente personnes mourront... » Quand, à 17 ans, Adolfo Kaminsky devient l'expert en faux papiers de la Résistance à Paris, il ne sait pas encore qu'il est pris dans un engrenage infernal, dans une course contre la montre, contre la mort, où chaque minute a la valeur d'une vie. Durant trente ans, il exécutera ce méticuleux travail de faussaire pour de nombreuses causes, mais jamais pour son propre intérêt. A travers son destin romanesque, et sous la plume de sa fille Sarah, on plonge au coeur d'une histoire de clandestinité, d'engagement, de traque et de peur. En arrière-plan du récit de sa vie se dessine le spectre d'un siècle où s'affrontent sans merci pouvoirs politiques, haines raciales, idéologies et luttes des peuples pour leur liberté et la dignité humaine. La Résistance, l'émigration clandestine des rescapés des camps avant la création d'Israël, le soutien au FLN, les luttes révolutionnaires d'Amérique du Sud, les guerres de décolonisation d'Afrique, l'opposition aux dictateurs d'Espagne, du Portugal et de Grèce, sont autant de combats pour lesquels il s'est en-gagé, au risque de sa vie et au prix de nombreux sacrifices. S'il a rejoint des causes en apparence contradictoires, Adolfo Kaminsky est toujours resté fidèle à ses convictions humanistes, à sa volonté de bâtir un monde de justice et de liberté.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Biography, World War II, Holocaust, Memoir, Jewish

258 pages, Paperback

First published September 23, 2009

About the author

Sarah Kaminsky is an actress, screenwriter and author born in Algeria. She was three years old when she immigrated to France with her father Adolfo Kaminsky, two brothers and her mother Leïla, a Tuareg Algerian, law student, and anti-colonial activist whose father was a progressive imam. Sarah Kaminsky’s first book is the best-selling biography of her father, Adolfo Kaminsky, published by Éditions Calmann-Lévy in 2009 and now translated into eight languages. She has a son and lives in Paris.

Reviews

[Sofialibrary · Rating 4 out of 5]

Foi bom começar o ano com um não ficção que cativa, de fácil e rápida leitura, com factos reais e interessantes.

Kaminsky é um judeu argentino que dedicou grande parte do seu tempo a falsificar documentos, desde a Segunda Guerra Mundial até aos anos 70, sem receber qualquer compensação financeira sob pena de comprometer os seus ideais.
Mesmo fazendo um trabalho clandestino procurou sempre que fosse por um bem maior ou por uma boa causa, recusando sempre fazê-lo para fins mais dúbios.

Com um grande capacidade de adaptação, improviso, disponibilidade, coragem, inteligência, altruísmo, ficamos a conhecer um Kaminsky determinado, idealista, criativo, sempre sob pressão e numa luta contra o tempo, um verdadeiro herói.

A história de vida do Kaminsky, enquanto falsificador, foi escrita pela filha mas com o discurso na primeira pessoa. Vale muito a pena, gostei muito.

[Xing Chen · Rating 5 out of 5]

A riveting and sometimes heart-wrenching biography on the life of a forger who devoted himself to emancipation of people and independence of nations. As a teenager, Kaminsky worked on a dairy farm, where he performed chemical tests to verify the quality of milk from suppliers. He avidly perused chemistry textbooks and performed experiments with a chemistry set, accumulating extensive knowledge of solvents and reactions. In his late teens, a chance encounter brought him in touch with members of the Resistance in Paris during the Second World War, and he began forging documents for Jewish people who needed to escape the country or go into hiding. He carried out careful analyses of sample documents to come up with new production techniques and improvised solutions, creating his own paper, inks, and stamps. His output spanned passports, identification documents, tickets for accommodation and transport, and all kinds of physical evidence to support a story that he sometimes had a hand in developing.

Well after the war ended, he continued to fight for the independence of people under colonial rule, in countries such as Algeria. Throughout his life, he insisted on doing this work for free, so that he would not be influenced in his choice of which causes to support. Needless to say, this meant a difficult double life, in which he undertook ordinary photographic assignments as a cover, and carried out his resistance work in secrecy, his struggles and assignments kept hidden even from his family.

The descriptions of his painstaking, technically demanding work, often exposed to the fumes of various chemicals and under incredibly tight deadlines with human lives at stake, are truly moving and convey a degree of altruism, compassion, and selflessness that is rarely seen. His clear, dogged determination belie his idealism, reminding me slightly of my father- an artistic genius who dedicated himself uncompromisingly to his vision and work, sometimes to the detriment of his health.

This incredible account probes the upper limits of what humans can achieve over a lifetime, combining technical depth and curiosity, resourcefulness and creativity, with deep concern for and dedication to the furthering of human rights.

[Clay · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this audio, read by one of my favorite readers, Simon Vance.

I'd read the NYT article and watched the short video linked below about inspiring forger-for-noble-causes Adolf Kaminsky's heroic work that saved tens of thousands from dictators, shattered lives and, in many cases, extermination. I secretly hope he is still working behind the scenes today. "Neutrality doesn't exist. To do nothing, say nothing, is enough to make one an accessory." - Adolf Kaminsky. VERY highly recommended.

Related article and video:

If I Sleep for an hour 30 People Will Die: NYT article about Adolfo Kaminsky: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/02/op...

Short Video on the NYT website:
https://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion...

[William Bentrim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Adolofo Kaminsky:A Forger's Life by Sarah Kaminsky

This is one of those books that has all kinds of accolades. I found it interesting but not compelling or captivating. I'm sure all the notables who raved about this book had good reasons to rave. I found myself interested but not enthralled. The book chronicles the life of a forger who happens to be Jewish. His religion led him to forge documents during the occupation of France during WWII. His forged documents most likely saved thousands of lives while endangering his own.

Kaminsky was unable to go "straight" after WWII. He became an activist for Algerian independence despite his claims of trying to get France to accept a friendly accommodation of the Algerians.

It is both laudable and questionable how Kaminsky lived. The saving of lives during WWII was highly laudable, the methods used to support his later causes seem somewhat questionable. It seems like Kaminsky always had good intentions but there is a question in my mind if some of his work didn't lead to unintended consequences.

The book was interesting.

https://www.ted.com/speakers/sarah_ka...

[Anita Yoder · Rating 4 out of 5]

This wasn't so much about WWII as about the life of one underground, subversive person driven by relentless high standards and the belief that everyone deserves life regardless of their ethnicity and the current political stance on that particular group.
"If I sleep one hour, thirty children will die." This artist/technician's obsession to stay underground and serve any one who came to his door couldn't sustain his marriages/affairs and he had no friends.
Written by his daughter in first person, this is a well-translated story of courage and commitment.

[sarka · Rating 4 out of 5]

přečteno šíleně dávno, tak jen zaznamenávám abych se kdyžtak mohla vrátit.
vzpomínka na silný příběh si vysloužila 4*

[Emma · Rating 5 out of 5]

VERDICT: Remarkable portrait of a hero who sacrificed his time and energy to save as many lives as possible through his unusual skills as a forger. Extremely inspiring story for our time, when the great people of our world rarely give us examples of justice and integrity.

my full review is here:
https://wordsandpeace.com/2017/03/28/...

[Ben · Rating 3 out of 5]

Incredible story, but the writing and the format don’t do it justice. I struggled to get through the second half of the book and found myself wishing it had been a novel rather than a memoir.

[Becca! · Rating 3 out of 5]

On audio for book club. Very interesting.

[Holly · Rating 4 out of 5]

what a fascinating life this man lived. what a hero

[Htiduj · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bien écrit, du suspens
J'ai aimé

[Sid Ahmed Khadraoui · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sarah emprunte la voix de son père pour nous raconter son passé de résistant qu’elle découvre et fouiner dans ses souvenirs, cet homme a multiples facettes qui a dévoué son temps et son savoir-faire a de nombreuses causes de par le globe et qui, peuvent paraitre contradictoires parfois mais reste humaines et justifiés. Elle nous emmène de la deuxième guerre mondiale et la résistance contre les nazis aux camps de concentrations à la colonisation de la Palestine à la guerre de libération de l’Algérie et des luttes sud-américaines. Un magnifique récit tout aussi captivant que la vie d’Aldofo qui ne nous laisse pas poser le livre de nos mains.

[Une lecture Helvétique · Rating 3 out of 5]

J'ai pas lu les dernières pages car la suite de l'histoire ne m'intéressait pas mais c'est un beau témoignage d'une période horrible de l'humanité. On oublie trop souvent les hommes et femmes courageux que les années 39-45 ont eu.

[Ben · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sarah Kaminsky’s account of her father’s life — written in first-person prose based on interviews with her father later in life, which allows the book to read as if it’s an autobiography written by Adolfo — is an incredible story. Adolfo’s almost happenstance personal interest and experience with dyes and chemistry, as a teen, and then later with various printing methods — all independent of formal schooling — combined with his experiences under the Nazi occupation of France, created the perfect subject, in terms of skills and determination, to become a document forger. Of course, it’s hard to know how credible all of his own testimony is, ultimately, but he seems to have lived by a consistent code of aiding those under occupation, colonization, or dictatorships, and veering away from any involvement with organized crime or terrorism. On several occasions his intuition saved him from getting caught by authorities (insisting on only single contacts; not agreeing to divulge names of French resistance comrades to a trusted friend who, it subsequently became clear, had been himself tricked by German counterintelligence into thinking the names were for aid rather than extermination, etc., etc.). At one point, he describes how he came up with a forgery solution for Swiss passport stock by way of a dream-intervention (by adding dissolved bandages to the paper pulp mixture). His range of skills spanned making custom paper, matching inks, recreating embossed seals via casts made with custom-mixed metals (for their lower melting points), various etching and engraving methods, etc. He readily admits the toll his secret work took on his personal life, for almost 30 years, but seems to have no regrets for his years of forging documents, only stopping when he became convinced he was on the verge of being uncovered by Western intelligence agencies for documents he had been creating for the African National Congress. For those interested in the history of leftist movements, it’s also interesting to note how Adolfo pinpoints the late-1970s as a “movement” turning point (by implication, both in terms of organizational strategy and document technologies).

[DONNA Edwards · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book based on the recommendation of the author of The Book of Lost Names. The book is a biography of Adolfo Kaminsky written by his daughter. She writes the book as if he is telling his story to her. Adolfo is A Jew born in Argentina and raised in France primarily.

The first third of the book covers his beginnings as a forger through his years with the French resistance. He was a genius at what he did and gives a very detailed and interesting account of the processes he used.

He continued for another 25 or more years forging documents for other freedom fighters around the world. He had a strict code of ethics which included not accepting payment for his work. The end of the book explains his motivation.

“In 1944 I saw that freedom could be gained by the determination and courage of a handful of people. As long as it didn’t go against honor and human values, a clandestine struggle was a serious, effective means and worthy of consideration. For thirty years, in my own way and with the only weapons at my disposal—technical knowledge, ingenuity and unshakable utopian ideals—I had fought against a reality that was too harrowing to observe or suffer without doing anything about it. Thanks to my conviction that I had the power to alter the course of things, that there was a better world to be made and that I could make a contribution. A world in which no one would need a forger. It’s still my dream.”

Much of his work as a forger was for people who got involved with one conflict after another around the world, often in countries where they had no personal connection. He evaluated each conflict and each request before agreeing or saying no.

To me, the book leaves the reader with a dilemma. When are illegal activities justified or even honored? It’s not hard to support all possible means - legal or illegal to defeat Hitler and the Nazis. But what about getting personally involved in resistance in Africa or South America or other places with no personal connection?

Regardless of how the reader answers those questions, we recognize Adolfo Kaminsky as a brave man who saved many lives.

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

Written like a first person memoir, the author was Kaminsky's daughter. Early on Kaminsky was forging personal documents to subvert the Nazi occupiers in Paris, but his activities evolve to support anti-colonialist and other secret groups worldwide, operating an almost industrial scale operation in Paris for about 30 years.

The first half to two-thirds flowed along and drew me in, but at some point the events began to seem repetitive in their presentation. I would not have missed anything by abandoning the book after the first 100-120 pages. (The text runs about 200 pages; there are also 14 black and white photographs at the end representing Kaminsky's artistic work as a photographer.)

Kaminsky never took money for his work forging documents, supporting himself, often with apparent difficulty, with other work. Towards the end he talks about his fruitless efforts to find someone who would replace him in doing this kind of work at something like the same scale, but inevitably he seemed to identify either ideological problems with his candidates or had not answer to the question, "where does the money come from?" The narrative doesn't address the question of why Kaminsky himself did this in a way that I take to mean that the answer is obvious, which perhaps on one level it is, but few among us act in this way. Is Kaminsky the one in a million honorable person among us? But reading that, I suppose if he (or his daughter) had tried to make a strong case for this, it would have taken away from that argument rather than reinforcing it.

Most of the book is set in France, with the action taking place in Paris, but there is considerable description of France's relationship with post-WWII Algeria that added to my (not very comprehensive) understanding of that topic.

[Carmen Bollinger · Rating 5 out of 5]

Adolfo Kaminsky began his life as a forger during WW2. He forged identity cards, birth certificates, baptismal records, etc. for Jews---and anyone else. He kept forging even after the war, creating fake visas for Jews to leave Europe.
He continued for forging---for an astounding number of reasons---until the 1970's.

"When Pierrot appealed to me and explained that the aim of his group's activities was to allow the survivors of the camps to immigrate to Palestine illegally, I at first refused. ...I refused to start taking part in illegal activities now that the war was over.
To convince me, Pierrot arranged for me to go with some GIs to the refugee camps. ....
Suddenly I saw them, on the other side of the barbed wire in prisoners' striped costumes. ...
I managed to talk to one of them who spoke fluent French. He was Polish, a former French teacher. he told me he'd have to be dead before he'd set foot in his old country again. They all said the same. The governments of their countries had betrayed them, being on European soil would always remind them of the atrocities they'd been subjected to. Nothing could break their determination, even if it meant staying in these camps to wait, or rot, for years if need be, until they could finally obtain a visa for Palestine."

[PennsyLady (Bev) · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an intriguing look at the lifework of Adolfo Kaminsky.
His daughter Sarah records and presents his life story and we see
the weighty responsibility he assumed working as a forger for the "French Resistance, the Algerian Independence Movement, and numerous clandestine organizations over the span of nearly thirty years." (publishers note)
His forte saved thousands of lives.
He assumes the role of narrator, adding extra interest to the read and provides some beautiful black and white images from his years as a professional photographer.

FIRST ENGLISH EDITION OF THE FRENCH BEST-SELLER

[Cheryl · Rating 2 out of 5]

I began reading this almost a month ago and it was really interesting in the beginning. His forging skills led him to the French Resistance, the FLN and many other freedom movements so that one started morphing into another with no discernible reason as to why. Then it just got boring and on page 147, I stopped reading and snuck in 6 other books. Now I cant bring myself to finish the book.

[The Jewish Book Council]

"Sarah Kaminsky provides a brilliant biography of an enormously complex, creative, and heroic individual: her father." Review by Philip K. Jason for the Jewish Book Council.

[Melody · Rating 4 out of 5]

A couldn't-put-it-down memoir detailing a clandestine life in the WW2 French underground resistance...and the oft-neglected years and decades that came after.

[loeilecoute · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant; a tour de force.
My only complaint is that I wanted more.
Can't wait till the movie comes out.

[Kate · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first 100 pages were fascinating as they told the story of his work as a forger in the french resistance in WWII. Learning the photography and chemistry. Then.... meh.

[Judy Schechter · Rating 2 out of 5]

I didn't actually finish this. I put it aside after awhile. It's a good story, but it needed either a better writer or a better translator. I just wasn't motivated to read it to the end.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

In these Trumpian days, the talk of resistance is loud and clear, even my hoodie has Smokey the Bear with shovel in hand and fist raised. Resistance was the first word out of our mouths, but how many of us know what it means? Was the Women's March resistance, or a spasm of anger and grief; is blocking a freeway, or smashing a window resistance? I suppose so, in its broadest form it's saying we don't accept the status quo, or the direction of the powers that be. Those acts may also give spine to the representatives in government who can block the most egregious wrongs of seated power, but there are other levels of resistance that most of us in our lives of 9 to 5, or blissful retirements don't often think about. Deep resistance, life or death, secretive, dangerous, mostly unsung, and it's that level that confronts us in Adolfo and Sarah Kaminsky's, A Forger's Life. It's Adolfo's story that his daughter transcribes in his voice. I think it's a "must read," for any of us who have engaged in resistance, at whatever level.

Adolfo was a seventeen year old clothes dyer's apprentice in Paris in 1944. He was also Jewish. He loved his work, and parlayed it into a study of chemistry, especially as it pertained to the alteration of fabrics that had been stained by possibly insoluble substances. He was really good at his work. By happenstance, or as happenstance as clandestine recruitments may be, he was approached by a member of the Jewish Resistance who asked him if he could remove stains from paper. Paper being a fabric, Adolfo responded positively, and before long was altering, forging, and creating documents that protected, or saved the lives of countless Jews, in and out of the organized resistance.

Adolfo continued his work for the next thirty years. After the war he worked with Zionist organizations against the British occupation of Palestine, for the Algerian freedom fighters, for struggles throughout Latin American, for the African National Congress, and for Americans resisting the Vietnam war. It's safe to say that by the time he retired in 1974 he (and his workshops) had provided papers for tens of thousands of freedom fighters, refugees, and "fellow travelers." He never worked for a government, and he was never payed for his work, or the documents he produced.

That's Resistance, with a capital "R." The book gave me a look at what is going on around the world, mostly out of sight, certainly out of the media, and if Adolfo is any model, at great expense to personal lives, and with great effect in struggles for justice.

Adolfo is 93, and resides in Paris. I learned about him through a NY Times award winning documentary. If this link works, here it is:

https://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion...

[Kino Inferno · Rating 5 out of 5]

J'ai dévoré ce petit livre (264 pages), que je recommande à tout le monde depuis.

« La neutralité n’existe pas. Ne rien faire, ne rien dire, c’est déjà être complice. »

Le début du livre n'est pas la lecture la plus facile du monde, car il commence par raconter son expérience en tant que faussaire pendant la guerre pour la résistance, donc même s’il ne rentre pas dans les détails, il parle de la déportation de certains de ses proches et de ses camarades de résistance), mais j’aime beaucoup le ton du livre, on sent qu’il est content d’enfin parler de cette partie de sa vie à sa fille, et qu’il est fier de raconter toutes ses expérimentations chimiques et toutes les techniques qu’il a trouvé pour faire de meilleurs faux papiers plus rapidement. Son bouquin est surtout plein d'espoir et d'énergie, il donne envie de croire que tout est possible, c'est très souvent très drôle, vraiment, c'est pas du tout une lecture plombante.

Adolfo Kaminsky a eu une vie absolument hallucinante, il a aidé toutes les causes juste de 1944 à 1971, produisant parfois des faux papiers pour plus de 15 pays différents (Amérique du Sud, anciennes colonies en Afrique, etc.) durant les années 60. Il a même fait un faux papier très médiatique pendant mai 68, que je vous laisserai découvrir !

Il dit à plusieurs reprises qu'il a eu la chance d'avoir exactement les bonnes compétences pour pouvoir aider, mais je ne peux qu'admirer son courage et sa détermination à être de toutes les causes justes. Il a consacré la majeure partie de sa vie, et a sacrifié un œil à ses différents combats, et nous lui devons beaucoup.

« La vie clandestine a des conséquences indélébiles. Elle s’imprime au plus profond de soi, et ne s’efface pas d’un revers de la main. Lorsqu’on a appris à vivre avec la peur au ventre, risqué sa vie, sa liberté, vécu des aventures dangereuses et romanesques, à en avoir des vertiges, toujours dans l’urgence et le don de soi à une cause qu’on a jugée pure, la réinsertion est une épreuve douloureuse. »

« Pour beaucoup, [la résistance] prit fin à la Libération. Pas pour moi. Ma vie de faussaire est une longue résistance ininterrompue car, après le nazisme, j’ai continué à résister aux inégalités, aux ségrégations, au racisme, aux injustices, au fascisme et aux dictatures. »

[Sam Creagar · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Stay awake. For as long as possible. Fight against sleep. It’s a simple calculation: in one hour I can make thirty blank documents; if I sleep for an hour, thirty people will die…”

The life of Adolfo Kaminsky is a remarkable story of rugged survival, unique genius, great personal sacrifice, & above all an insatiable desire to fight for what he believed to be right. After Nazis invaded his hometown of Vire, France in the early 1940s he & the rest of his Jewish family experienced the horrors of an internment camp, managing to escape (twice) while people he knew and loved were tortured & murdered every day. Such early exposure to war, racism, & evil unleashed left Kaminsky with a longing to do whatever he could to help save lives. A combination of his past experiences, analytical intelligence, & passion for fighting injustice led him to his contribution to the Resistance: forging documents to help people flee from oppression, participate in espionage, & fight back.

After World War II Kaminsky continued to offer his talents to resistance movements all over the world. For 30 years his forgeries helped tens of thousands of men, women, & children escape oppression & death in Europe, Africa, & South America. He never accepted any payment for his work. He just wanted to do his part in making the world a place where freedom & equality could be attained by all.

His life unfolds like a wild Hollywood spy thriller. Kaminsky worked with code-named resistance agents (like Water Lily, Penguin, The Old Man), made secret drops of expertly forged documents, & even sabotaged a bomb of his own making. He loved & believed in his work, though it regularly caused his personal life to fall apart. To this day Kaminsky is still piecing together loving relationships with his children. That’s how this book came to be -- his daughter, actress & screenwriter Sarah Kaminsky, decided to interview her father so that she & her own children could get to know the spy, secret agent, resistance operative, & world-class forger Adolfo Kaminsky. This book is easy & fun to read, and well worth your time. I’d recommend it to anyone. Enjoy!

[JUDITH KLAYMAN · Rating 3 out of 5]

I very much enjoyed the first half of the book. Kaminsky's description of his early years, in which he was imprisoned due to being a Jew, was released due to being an Argentinian citizen, and then joined the French resistance were fascinating. He describes the working of the resistance and of his own tasks as a forger in detail. Immediately after WWII he continued working as a forger so that Holocaust survivors could emigrate to Israel. But by the time I reached the last half of the book, which describe his activities to support Algerians in their war for independence and other left-wing movements that used violence to support their causes, I was a little sick of his singular focus on his forging work and methods. Furthermore, his dedication to his causes was so extreme that he failed to support his first-born children, lied to and ignored the women he was involved with, and generally led a very self-centered life. His sexism and his failure to come up with an overall ethical system for evaluating his work was troubling to me. But again, this book is based on oral interviews he gave his daughter from a marriage he began relatively late in his life, after he retired from working as a forger. By then he was elderly. Nonetheless it is telling that he appeared to remember more about the details of the methodology he employed while he worked as a forger than about his motives for continuing to do this work. It is easy to understand why violence was necessary to fight the Nazis, but his assistance to violent revolutionaries, some of whom ended up establishing repressive dictatorships, is not self-explanatory. The latter activities deserved a more thoughtful explanation regarding his ethics and rationales for continuing to work as a forger in the 50s and early 60s.

[Miles · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a completely gripping story of a forger's life. Adolfo Kaminsky cut his teeth producing documents to save children from the Holocaust in occupied France and then spent thirty years underground creating documents for various liberation movements, from the FLN (Algeria) to the ANC to others.

He describes his life underground, his peripatetic love life, his laboratories, his strict trade-craft, his refusal to accept payment and more. He sees himself always as a freedom fighter, not a mercenary.

Kaminsky's struggle was to enable people to move about in the world, to aid the refugee and to fight injustice. His shield was deep anonymity, as he insisted on one point of contact and no more and searched constantly for a few trustworthy people. He refused as many or more jobs than he accepted, always judging whether the cause and purpose was worthy before he created the document.

The life he led is extraordinary, and the final pages brought me to tears. I can't even say exactly why, except that one is left with an impression of extraordinary integrity.

The book is based on extended interviews by his daughter. It reads like a man talking at a cafe, telling a story. This is a somewhat unusual style, but in no way off-putting.

If you've ever enjoyed the problem of hidden and double identities, the problem of how a quiet person can wage war against injustice, or the subterfuge of a life underground, beholden to no one person or movement but only to one's personal vision of what is just and right... this book will touch you and grip you.

I really loved this.

[Lynn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Many may have seen the 60Minutes segment done on Adolfo Kaminsky. The book goes far beyond his work during World War II when he began his hidden career as a mere teenager. The work he did for the Resistance in France saved countless lives since his brilliant forgeries allowed them to escape Occupied France or the country altogether. His mission always was to work to free oppressed people. He was vehemently against colonialism and this along with his fervent belief in peoples' rights/freedom led him to continue his forgeries long after the war. He worked for human rights all over the world for 30 years.
His daughter chose to write the book in her father's direct, first person words taken from the many hours of interviews she did with him. This lets you into his life in an intimate way as he describes the excitement he always had for discovery and solving chemistry problems. Use of the first person allows the reader to feel the weight of the realities and extreme tension of living a double life - always on the move, never revealing any confidences, making sure you never compromised anyone. At the same time, he also had to maintain a real business and was an accomplished photographer
Her father describes the emotional toll and responsibilities of knowing that so many lives depended on perfectly forged documents in a straightforward manner, never tinged with self-pity regarding all of the sacrifices he had to make. The work drove him to exhaustion but his extraordinary commitment kept him going.