The Lost Childhood: A World War II Memoir

A gripping, extraordinary memoir of six years in the life of a daring and resourceful Polish Jewish boy and his family, who survived the Holocaust using false papers and posing as Catholics.

Yehuda Nir was nine years old when his father was shot dead by German soldiers in a mass execution of Jewish men in their Polish town. Yehuda, along with his mother and teenage sister, escaped with the aid of false documents. It was 1941–the Holocaust was gaining a grim momentum. The family plunged into what would be four long, harrowing years disguised as Catholics. Never knowing if each day of hiding in the open would be his last, Yehuda was often forced to separate from his mother and sister, live on dogs and mice, hide in sewers, and live in utter chaos.