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In my hands : memories of a Holocaust rescuer / Irene Gut Opdyke with Jennifer Armstrong.

by Opdyke, Irene Gut, 1921-

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New York : Anchor Books, 2001.

Opdyke, Irene Gut, 1921- -- Juvenile literature.

Righteous Gentiles in the Holocaust -- Poland -- Biography -- Juvenile literature.

World War, 1939-1945 -- Jews -- Rescue -- Poland -- Juvenile literature.

World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Polish. -- Juvenile literature.

Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Poland -- Juvenile literature.

0385720327 (pbk.)

248 p., [20] p. of plates : ill. ; 22 cm.

1st Anchor Books ed.

I was almost fast enough -- Finding wings -- Where could I come to rest? -- Amber -- Postscript -- Polish: a rough guide to pronunciation -- German: a rough guide to pronunciation -- Some historical background -- Note on the writing of this books.

In My Hands began as one non-Jew's challenge to any who would deny the Holocaust. Much like The Diary of Anne Frank, it has become a profound document of an individual's heroism in the face of the greatest evil mankind has known. In the fall of 1939 the Nazis invaded Irene Gut's beloved Poland, ending her training as a nurse & thrusting the sixteen-year-old Catholic girl into a world of degradation that somehow gave her the strength to accomplish what amounted to miracles. Forced into the service of the German army, young Irene was able, due in part to her Aryan good looks, to use her position as a servant in an officers' club to steal food & supplies (and even information overheard at the officers' tables) for the Jews in the ghetto. She went on to smuggle Jews out of the work camps, ultimately hiding a dozen people in the home of a Nazi major for whom she was housekeeper. An important addition to the literature of human survival & heroism, In My Hands stakes an impressive claim as a contemporary classic. "Opdyke's life reads more dramatically than most Hollywood action movies or John Le Carre spy novels." --Newsday. "Nightmarish, uplifting & ultimately triumphant." --The Dallas Morning News. "Haunting...awe-inspiring." --Seattle Post-Intelligencer. "Few memoirs of the Holocaust tell in such vivid detail what it was like for a non-Jew to risk life day after day, year after year, to save the lives of people Hitler was bound to exterminate. No one reading In My Hands will ever forget the devotion to humanity this young Polish Catholic girl lived, & almost died, by." --Milton Meltzer, author of Never to Forget: The Jews of the Holocaust. "Even among WWII memoirs--a genre studded with extraordinary stories--this autobiography looms large, a work of exceptional substance & style.... Readers will be riveted--& no one can fail to be inspired by Opdyke's courage." --Publishers Weekly, starred & boxed review. Annotation. In My Hands began as one non-Jew's challenge to any who would deny the Holocaust. Much like The Diary of Anne Frank, it has become a profound document of an individual's heroism in the face of the greatest evil mankind has known. In the fall of 1939 the Nazis invaded Irene Gut's beloved Poland, ending her training as a nurse and thrusting the sixteen-year-old Catholic girl into a world of degradation that somehow gave her the strength to accomplish what amounted to miracles. Forced into the service of the German army, young Irene was able, due in part to her Aryan good looks, to use her position as a servant in an officers' club to steal food and supplies (and even information overheard at the officers' tables) for the Jews in the ghetto. She smuggled Jews out of the work camps, ultimately hiding a dozen people in the home of a Nazi major for whom she was housekeeper. An important addition to the literature of human survival and heroism, In My Hands is further proof of why, in spite of everything, we must believe in the goodness of people.

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