“How did they get out?” Spend any amount of time among Jews of a certain age, and once done kvelling about their grandchildren and complaining about various physical ailments, the question is likely to arise. There is at least a comfort in not having to explain what is being asked.
For Daniel Finkelstein, the author of Hitler, Stalin, Mum and Dad, it is not one with a straightforward answer. The journey to freedom on which his family embarked following the outbreak of the Second World War encompassed Switzerland, Paraguay, the United States and ultimately Britain, via the death camps of Belsen and the gulags of Siberia. That any of them survived, and he should be around to tell the story, is little short of miraculous.
