A crisis of faith follows a mother and daughter in this beautifully
rendered, harrowing WWII memoir
With the heartrending We Are on Our Own, Miriam Katin recounts the
story of her escape from German-occupied Hungary as a child, led by her
determined mother. The two fled Budapest near the end of WWII and at the
age of sixty-three Katin enshrined her memory in these extraordinary
pages, originally published in hardcover more than fifteen years ago.
In 1944, Miriam is a toddler beloved by her dog Rexy, but when her
mother is forced to give up their "Jewish dog" to the German
authorities, Miriam's world begins to unravel. The two flee to the
countryside after faking their deaths and traversing lands blanketed
with snow. Miriam's fragmented childhood memories of forests, chocolate,
strange men, and the noise of war are reconstituted in this beautifully
told epic journey where the innocence of a child is set against
unthinkable violence.
Another crisis, one of faith, haunts the severed family on their path.
Struggling to reunite with Miriam's father who has been conscripted to
the Hungarian army, mother and daughter contemplate God, wondering how
He could allow such destruction. Poetic words of the Torah combine with
images of war as Miriam examines the theological dilemma both victims as
well as survivors of the Shoah. When Miriam and her mother hide with a
winemaker, they soothe their nerves with the tonic, reciting "God is
red. God is in the glass." God, they understand, is in the very human
will to survive, and in that pursuit of survival, we are truly on our
own.
