A Jewish Girl in the Weimar Republic

While many books focus on the atrocities that occurred in Nazi Germany, few discuss Jewish life before Hitler.

In the introduction to A Jewish Girl in the Weimar Republic, Stephanie Orfali writes that she is "trying to capture a childhood that was lived sitting on a volcano that finally erupted…. This book is about the personal experiences of [her] family, [her] friends, and [herself], as well as all the events that led to the ascendance of Adolf Hitler during the years of the ill-fated Weimar Republic." Orfali describes growing up in Germany-mostly in Nuremberg-with the focus on her childhood and adolescence.

She describes plunking out notes during her piano lesson, taking flying lessons in a two-seater open airplane, her first kiss, and exploring a forest with her Doberman pinscher, Fritz. These sections contrast sharply with the end of the book, when her non-Jewish college classmates joined the Nazi party, non-Jewish neighbors were barred from Orfali's family furniture store (or any Jewish business), and some of Orfali's family members and friends were murdered by the Nazis.

The book ends with Orfali's escape to Israel, although she now lives in Chicago with her husband and four children. What the author lacks in lyrical writing, is made up in her honest, chatty style. Orfali's factual memoir about her colorful family helps fill the gap in Holocaust literature.