Review of "Tears of Amber" by Sofia Segovia

Tears of Amber by Sofía Segovia
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This was the first book I'd ever read written about "the OTHER side". I've read plenty of books about the oppressed, and more specifically, the persecuted peoples of WWII... but never have I read about what it was like for the ordinary German people who started off fully embracing & supporting Hitler & the Nazi Regime.

Let me start by saying... whoa.

So, the book follows two families from different statuses & different towns, and also an orphaned boy, during the years of Hitler's rise to power, through the war, and on past its bitter end. And MY GOSH, how well-written their stories are!

I've heard my fair share of war stories from the viewpoint of a peasant farmer via my mom, who grew up in China during Japan's invasion... so the hardships the families all eventually found themselves in were all too familiar a tale to me. What was "new" (for me) was the realization that the German people (especially those on the Eastern side of the country) had it really bad towards the end of the whole deal. I hadn't even considered that the Germans suffered... I know, I know... don't judge me. I know, pretty ignorant of me, but it's the truth.

I remember the Berlin Wall coming down. I remember it being toted as this BIG DEAL... But I find it funny how this fictional book (based on real people), read some 32 years later, is finally putting into perspective for me some of the biases that existed, long before that wall ever went up, that divided a country in such a concrete way (pun intended).

Sorry, where was I?

So the author didn't hold back... my gosh, there's pain, and violence, and death, and some vivid imagery. But for a long time, I was reading about these seemingly "normal" families just living their best, ordinary-in-the-middle-of-their-country's-huge-looming-success-in-the-war-lives, thinking to myself, "this isn't too bad." And then slowly and steadily their lives begin to change... Little by little, they compromise and they make sacrifices... small ones at first, extra food, extra clothes... then bigger ones... They (mostly unwillingly) gave away their lands, their children, their fathers... then their ideals and values, then their most precious, of secret valuables... and then for more than some, ultimately their lives. And it's just this smooth/steady incline to the ultimate, sharp decline in their shared human experience.

And it's all written in a way that was impossible to look away from.

I've often questioned if we as a people would ever again fall into the same trap of hatred & destruction under a falsehood of hope & greatness, and the answer is always an unfortunate, terrifying & resounding, yes... Yes, of course, we will & of course, we can... The saying (paraphrasing, probably) "Those who do not study history are doomed to repeat it," is scarily accurate. Germany learned... learned the extremely hard & terrible lesson, and on a global, modern, scale. But they DID learn. There are no Nazi or Hitler statues in Germany. Nazi imagery/propaganda is illegal/not tolerated. But what of the rest of the world?

Did we learn?

Yeah, this book moved me... at least it moved my IDGAF-o-meter a little more towards Idk, empathy for others?

Ya know, nobody wins in war. They're all losers. And for the survivors, the effects of war don't stop with them, they're felt for many generations afterward.

This book is heartbreaking, but my goodness, it's such a necessary read. Look, if you're not able to speak to a REAL person, face to face, that survived the war, any war, then start reading some books like this... learn from the ugliest of human nature, vicariously through (based on real) fictional characters... And tell everyone else to, too. Maybe we can all GAF again about humanity as a whole and stop another genocidal a-hole from rising to power.

There is no good & evil... just nuance & our concessions left to the interpretation & judgment of our descendants.

Final thought... Just read the book. And sorry for waxing poetic, this is why I usually try to stay with a format. Sorry again.

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