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THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER

‘Epic, moving and important’ ROBERT HARRIS

‘I’m not sure I’ve ever come across quite such a revelatory account of the Holocaust and yet despite the horror and the sadness it’s also a ‘memoir of miraculous survival’. I can’t recommend it enough’ ANTHONY HOROWITZ

‘A modern classic’ OBSERVER

‘An unforgettable epic of a book’ DAILY MAIL

From longstanding political columnist and commentator Daniel Finkelstein, a powerful memoir exploring both his mother and his father’s devastating experiences of persecution, resistance and survival during the Second World War.

Daniel’s mother Mirjam Wiener was the youngest of three daughters born in Germany to Alfred and Margarete Wiener. Alfred, a decorated hero from the Great War, is now widely acknowledged to have been the first person to recognise the existential danger Hitler posed to the Jews and began, in 1933, to catalogue in detail Nazi crimes. After moving his family to Amsterdam, he relocated his library to London and was preparing to bring over his wife and children when Germany invaded the Netherlands. Before long, the family was rounded up, robbed and sent to starve in Bergen-Belsen.

Daniel’s father Ludwik was born in Lwow, the only child of a prosperous Jewish family. In 1939, after Hitler and Stalin carved up Poland, Ludwik’s father was arrested and sentenced to hard labour in the Gulag. Meanwhile, deported to Siberia and working as a slave labourer on a collective farm, Ludwik survived the freezing winters in a tiny house he built from cow dung.

Hitler, Stalin, Mum and Dad is a deeply moving, personal and at times horrifying memoir about Finkelstein’s parents’ experiences at the hands of the two genocidal dictators of the twentieth century. It is a story of persecution; survival; and the consequences of totalitarianism told with the almost unimaginable bravery of two ordinary families shining through.

‘Danny Finkelstein has written an elegant, moving account of the history of one family, and in doing so shines light on the history of the 20th century. If you want to understand Hitler and Stalin, read this book about people whose lives were upended by both of them’ ANNE APPLEBAUM, author of Gulag: A History, winner of the Pulitzer Prize

Publisher Review

Early Praise for Hitler, Stalin, Mum and Dad 'A terrific piece of work, epic, moving and important, the grim history of 20th century Europe encapsulated in one extraordinary, ordinary family' Robert Harris 'This truly remarkable book brings vividly home the horrors perpetrated against one family by Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin, serving as an indictment of their crimes against millions. Diligently researched, beautifully written and on occasion unbearably moving, this is a powerful moral work about political extremism and the importance of bearing witness, but at the heart of it is love' Andrew Roberts, author of Churchill: Walking with Destiny 'Danny Finkelstein has written an elegant, moving account of the history of one family, and in doing so shines light on the history of the 20th century. If you want to understand Hitler and Stalin, read this book about people whose lives were upended by both of them' Anne Applebaum, Author of Gulag: A History, winner of the Pulitzer Prize 'This is a powerful and moving account of one family's story of resilience and survival during one of the most terrible periods of human history. It will never not be acutely relevant. Everyone should read it' Sonia Sodha 'Daniel Finkelstein's beautifully written book Hitler, Stalin, Mum and Dad is a tale of survival and humanity surrounded by death and brutality. At a time when Holocaust denial is on the rise among the young, and people talk fondly again of communism, it is a reminder that for all their problems, our wonderful, messy democracy and our great shared European civilisation must be constantly defended' George Osborne 'An extraordinary story - both horrifying and inspiring - that grips you completely from start to finish' Gyles Brandreth 'Hitler Stalin Mum and Dad is superb. An extraordinary story: moving and terrible but redemptive' Jonathan Dimbleby