It’s been awhile since I’ve reviewed a WWII/Holocaust novel for the blog. Couldn’t let that go on any longer! Enter in Heather Morris’s Three Sisters. I read and loved her novels The Tattooist of Auschwitz and the sequel Cilka’s Journey, so I was delighted to see she had published a third book in this series. What I love about her books is that they are always unique standalone stories that don’t build upon the previous novels, though you find references to characters and circumstances to link them together. You don’t need to remember what happened in the previous books or even bother reading them if you don’t want to. It’s an interesting way to do a historical fiction “series.”
Three Sisters tells the true story of the Mela girls – Cibi, Magda, and Livia. We meet them as the war already rages and follow them as they are torn from their home and taken to Auschwitz-Birkenau (the infamous Nazi death camp in Poland). The girls have made a promise to always stay together, and they fight to keep that promise as they struggle for their lives.
One of my favorite things about this novel is that Morris doesn’t end the story with the liberation of Auschwitz. Rather, she carries on to tell of the girls’ recovery, their trip back home, and most interestingly, their move to be part of the foundling country of Israel. To make their home in a country where they will be truly free. That part of the story – their traveling from Europe to Israel and settling there – is one I don’t feel is regularly told, and I enjoyed it very much.
I thought the sisters’ bond was heartwarming and inspiring. I saw glimmers of my relationship with my own sister in their interactions and was moved by their selflessness to keep each other not only alive but together. The suffering in Auschwitz-Birkenau by the girls and the thousands others who were forced into the camps is not glossed over, but it is not overly graphic either. I felt Morris handled the healing and reconciling of these poor broken women after three years there tactfully. Questions and discussions surrounding survivor’s guilt and how to move forward were prevalent in the latter half of the novel, and I thought the dialogue and writing here was well done. I also enjoyed the growth of the individual sisters as they came into adulthood, became wives, and entered into motherhood.
The only thing I did not love about the novel was the pacing. It seemed like we spent a lot of time in Auschwitz, focusing on little details of the girls’ daily lives there. Yet, once the story’s focus shifted to their transition back to society and eventual relocation to Israel, everything seemed very big picture. There was a lot of telling what happened, where they were, how much time had passed with little emphasis on details that comprised the first half. Their marriages and the births of their children – huge life events that I would have expected to bring up some of the trauma and memories from the camps and losing their families – were largely glossed over. I wouldn’t say the second half felt rushed; rather, I didn’t always love where she placed her emphasis and spent the bulk of her time.
Otherwise, this was an excellent Holocaust novel. I definitely recommend it, especially because of its uniqueness. I’ve read a number of Holocaust books, and this one stands out to me because of the sister relationship and the post-war storytelling. Again, you don’t need to read Morris’ previous novels (Tattooist of Auschwitz and Cilka’s Journey) to read this one, but I would encourage you to. They are all very well done.
Jessica
Copyright Heather Morris and St. Martin’s Press. Image from Amazon.
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