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'The universe began shrinking,' wrote Elie Wiesel of his Holocaust experiences in Hungary, 'first we were supposed to leave our towns and concentrate in the larger cities. Then the towns shrank to the ghetto, and the ghetto to a house, the house to a room, the room to a cattle car...' Adopting an innovative multi-perspectival approach framed around a wide variety of material traces - from receipts to maps, name lists to photographs - Tim Cole tells stories of journeys into and out of Hungarian ghettos. These stories of the perpetrators who oversaw ghettoization and deportation, the bystanders who witnessed and aided these journeys, and the victims who undertook them reveal the spatio-temporal dimensions of the Holocaust. But they also point to the visibility of these events within the ordinary spaces of the city, the importance of an economic assault on Jews and the marked gendering of the Holocaust in Hungary.

Witnessing the Holocaust presents the autobiographical writings, including diaries and autobiographical fiction, of six Holocaust survivors who lived through and chronicled the Nazi genocide. Drawing extensively on the works of Victor Klemperer, Ruth Kluger, Michal Glowinski, Primo Levi, Imre Kertész and Béla Zsolt, this books conveys, with vivid detail, the persecution of the Jews from the beginning of the Third Reich until its very end. It gives us a sense both of what the Holocaust meant to the wider community swept up in the horrors and what it was like for the individual to weather one of the most shocking events in history. Survivors and witnesses disappear, and history, not memory, becomes the instrument for recalling the past. Judith M. Hughes secures a place for narratives by those who experienced the Holocaust in person. This compelling text is a vital read for all students of the Holocaust and Holocaust memory.

In Volume I, 399 Days: An American Adventure, the Taylor family visited the 48 contiguous United States. Their experiences bonded them together as never before. In their travels, they happened upon parades, concerts, regional festivals, holiday celebrations, and state fairs. The changing seasons brought natures kaleidoscope of colors. Although there were arguments and hurt feelings, they found grace and forgiveness through their relationships with Jesus Christ. Sometimes the challenges seemed to come from all directions, as they get sick, sore, snowed in, sent away, misquoted, misled, pulled over, and locked out. Through it all, the Lord provided and the family as thrived. Now the Taylors are ready for even higher adventure: a new continent with foreign languages, new currencies, exotic foods, and unfamiliar customs. When they mention their plans to others, most people shake their heads. They say its crazy. Maybe it is. Join them now as they embark on Volume II, 399 Days: Our European Escapade.

They needed an escape plan! After losing their business, facing bankruptcy and foreclosure, then being frightened by a vision of their future, in a ratty trailer park watching Little House On The Prairie reruns, Lollie Hoxie hatches an ideabut she doesnt share it with her husband right away. In this, her first memoir, Hoxie explains with honest humor what happens next when they take an exploratory vacation to Ecuador, return home to sell everything they own, rent their house, and go back to permanently relocate in the little city of Gualaceo. Her resulting adventure involves the trials and tribulations of living with people who speak no English, negotiating precarious bus rides in the country, and traveling through a strange little town with dirt roads and a drunken immigration official, to name a few. There are side trips to Peru lasting longer than planned with terrific consequences and delicious calamities along the way. Finding Joy in Ecuador is filled with Hoxies sarcastic humor, contrasted with moments of self-reflection that, at times, take her confidence to the woodshed and threaten to end her marriage. Finding Joy in Ecuador lovingly describes an adventure that taught this couple about themselves and their love for each other. It also revealed to them an aspect of their American culture: the game of accumulating stuff. And, then, how remarkably fun it was for them to live without it! This memoir is a rollercoaster ride into retirement overseas; a fun and exhilarating, sometimes scary adventure of the way it really is. For people who want to get a true glimpse of daily life in this foreign country, its a rare find!

Lori Bassel is a testament to the old clich, blondes have more fun. In her collection of lighthearted essays, Bassel, a former Naples, Florida, bartender, pokes fun at her real-life experiences and shares many of the same stories she entertained her loyal customers with during her stints at local clubs. Bassel begins by narrating her hilarious adventures from high schoola time when she and her best friend, Lisa, reveled in tormenting lovers at a local midwestern park. With steamed-over windows, the lovers never saw the girls coming as they hopped on the trunk, dashed over the top of the car, and down the hoodmost likely scaring the couples in the car half to death. From the time she spray painted her boyfriends old Chevy (without his permission) to the time she ran out of gas and had the entire cheerleading squad, dressed in uniform, pushing her truck down North US 41, Bassel shares one laugh-out-loud story after another. Real Blonde Stories is a delightful collection of one womans blonde moments in life, teaching both men and women to find the humor in every day moments.