Fifteen-year-old Hanka Kaudersov has ginger hair and clear, green eyes. When her family is deported to Auschwitz, her mother, father and younger brother are sent to the gas chamber. By a twist of fate, Hanka is faced with a simple alternative: follow her family, or work in an SS brothel behind the eastern front. She chooses to live, her Aryan looks allowing her to disguise the fact that she is … Jewish. As the German army retreats from the Russian front, Hanka battles cold, hunger, fear, and shame, sustained by her hatred for the men she entertains, her friendship with the mysterious Estelle, and her fierce, burning desire for life. Lovely Green Eyes explores the compromises and sacrifices that an individual may make in order to survive, the way a woman can retain her identity in the face of appalling trauma, and the value of human life itself. This is a remarkable novel, which soars beyond nightmare, leaving the reader with a transcendent sense of hope.
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Hard to follow the little plot that there was.
I knew going in this would be a tragic book. I was confused in places and felt the ending poor.
Disjointed
Depressing
This was a difficult read. I would give it higher stars for the story but the writing was difficult to follow. I’m not sure if it was because of the translation or my inability to follow the story
It was hard to read about the atrocities described in the book…but these things did happen and evidently the author had some first-hand knowledge of what happened during the Holocaust
My rating would be 4 1/2 stars but that was not available.
Well thought out story and presented in a way that made you feel that you were watching rather than reading. Excellent use of language and in a class with a similarly themed book called “The Kommandant’s Mistress” by Sherri Szeman.
I will look for more of Lustig’s books.
I started and stopped this book twice. Finally gave up after reading 55% of it.
Hard to read
This book uncovered (for me) another aspect of the evil of the Nazis, prostitution of women for soldiers’ pleasure and the effect on those women. How disposable they were and how much they wanted to just survive. It does end fairly well and a small amount of justice is obtained by the main character.
Very intense gut-wrenching subject. Tells about an aspect of the Holocaust I new little about- the brothels for the Germans using camp prisoners. Again, depicting the depravity of the Nazi mind. The mental fortitude needed to survive that hell is beyond words. I highly doubt I would have had the strength to survive that nightmare