The Stone Crusher: The True Story of a Father and Son's Fight for Survival in Auschwitz

The Stone Crusher: The True Story of a Father and Son's Fight for Survival in Auschwitz

by Jeremy Dronfield

Narrated by Christopher Lane

Unabridged — 13 hours, 16 minutes

The Stone Crusher: The True Story of a Father and Son's Fight for Survival in Auschwitz

The Stone Crusher: The True Story of a Father and Son's Fight for Survival in Auschwitz

by Jeremy Dronfield

Narrated by Christopher Lane

Unabridged — 13 hours, 16 minutes

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Overview

In 1939, Gustav Kleinmann, a Jewish upholsterer in Vienna, was arrested by the Nazis. Along with his 16-year old son Fritz, he was sent to Buchenwald in Germany, where a new concentration camp was being built. It was the beginning of a five-year odyssey almost without parallel. They helped build Buchenwald, young Fritz learning construction skills which would help preserve him from extermination in the coming years. But it was his bond with his father that would ultimately keep them both alive. When the 50-year old Gustav was transferred to Auschwitz—a certain death sentence—Fritz was determined to go with him. His wiser friends tried to dissuade him—"If you want to keep living, you have to forget your father," they said. But that was impossible, and Fritz pleaded for a place on the Auschwitz transport. "He is a true comrade," Gustav wrote in his secret diary, "always at my side. The boy is my greatest joy. We are inseparable." Gustav kept his diary hidden throughout his six years in the death camps—even Fritz knew nothing of it. In it he recorded his story, a tale of survival and a father-son bond which proved stronger than the machine that sought to break them both.


Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

05/28/2018
The horrors of the Holocaust are effectively conveyed on a human scale in this gripping account of the experiences of Gustav Kleinmann and his son Fritz, from the German takeover of Austria in 1938 through their incredible survival of imprisonment in a series of concentration camps. Dronfield, a novelist and historian, has supplemented Gustav’s diary of life in the camps and Fritz’s memoir with other primary sources to craft an account accessible even to those with no knowledge of the relevant history. Following the imposition of Nazi proscriptions on Austrian Jews, the Kleinmanns scramble to sustain themselves while looking for a path to safety, hindered by the outside world’s general reluctance to offer refuge. Before they can find a way out of Vienna, both Gustav and Fritz, aged 14, are arrested and sent to Buchenwald. Their experiences alternate with those of their other family members— two of whom build new lives in the U.S. and England, and two of whom die. While some readers may find Dronfield’s attempt to conclude on a positive note (“In the end the Kleinmann family not only survived, but prospered”) forced, this account personalizes an atrocity, the depravity of which is difficult to come to grips with. Agent: Andrew Lownie, Andrew Lownie Literary Agency Ltd. (July)

From the Publisher

"Heart-wrenching yet compelling, The Stone Crusher is the vivid true story of a father and son's survival of absolute horror. Beautifully written, deeply poignant in its detail, it is a necessary testament today in the fight against Holocaust denial." —Helen Fry, author of The London Cage: The Secret History of Britain's World War II Interrogation Center


Praise for Jeremy Dronfield's Previous Books:

"Vivid and engaging...a moving and appalling tale of the full horror of World War II's last year on the eastern front." —Randall Hansen, author of Fire and Fury: The Allied Bombing of Germany, 1942–1945

"An elegant and sensitive biography...[an] absorbing book." —Times (London)

"Immensely enjoyable. It's a fascinating story, told with verve, sensitivity, and skill—the result of an awe-inspiring amount of research and detective work, managed with delicacy and flair....A marvellous read, and a story worth telling." —Rodney Bolt, author of The Librettist of Venice 

"This book could read like a thriller, yet the thorough research here provides a weightier feast...a well-researched and well-ordered biography." —Spectator

"Meticulously researched and written with great verve, this biography is about as good as it gets." —Neil McKenna, author of The Secret Life of Oscar Wilde

"A scintillating portrait...that feels almost Dickensian in style." —Guardian

"A riveting, tense, and ultimately satisfying account." —Booklist


"The horrors of the Holocaust are effectively conveyed on a human scale in this gripping account." —Publishers Weekly

Kirkus Reviews

★ 2018-04-30
The story of a father and son who struggled to survive in some of the Holocaust's most horrendous sites, from Buchenwald to Auschwitz to Mauthausen to Bergen-Belsen.Dronfield (The Locust Farm, 2013, etc.), a biographer, historian, and ghostwriter who also writes fiction, returns with a thoroughly researched, deeply grim account of the Kleinmanns, a Viennese family devastated by the Holocaust. Although his principal focus is on the father, Gustav, and son, Fritz, the author does occasionally shift to others, some of whom did not survive. The title image—the stone crusher—is a mechanical device in a stone quarry at Buchenwald, and Dronfield employs it as a metaphor for the entire Holocaust—it is among the book's final images. The Kleinmanns, father and son, were able to cope with the unspeakable rigors of the concentration camps because they possessed manual skills that the Nazis required and employed. Gustav was an upholsterer, and Fritz, quick and able with his hands, learned to lay bricks and perform other tasks the camps needed. One of the most moving aspects of the book is the relationship between Fritz and his father; both struggled mightily to stay together, and neither was interested in abandoning the other. Dronfield also does an effective job keeping us informed about the wider war so that when the liberators approach, we are prepared. The author uses the father's diary as a key document, but, as the endmatter demonstrates, he has consulted the principal Holocaust archives and documents and conducted interviews as well. The resulting swift, novelistic narrative clarifies the brutality in ways that traditional histories sometimes do not.Today, when studies are showing many Americans know little about the Holocaust, this will serve as a compelling remedy: a personal and universal account of brutality at its worst and of family devotion at its best.

Product Details

BN ID: 2940171355326
Publisher: Brilliance Audio
Publication date: 07/01/2018
Edition description: Unabridged
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