Helga's Diary

By Helga Weiss, Neil Bermel (translator),

Book cover of Helga's Diary: A Young Girl's Account of Life in a Concentration Camp

Book description

In 1939, Helga Weiss was a young Jewish schoolgirl in Prague. As she endured the first waves of the Nazi invasion, she began to document her experiences in a diary. During her internment at the concentration camp of Terezin, Helga's uncle hid her diary in a brick wall. Of the…

When you buy books, we may earn a commission that helps keep our lights on (or join the rebellion as a member).

Why read it?

1 author picked Helga's Diary as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

There are several books I could recommend written by adults who were imprisoned as children in Terezin during the war, but this one stands out because of its artwork interspersed with factual accounts of daily life. Indeed, it’s the factual perspective she takes in her descriptions that makes them so heart-wrenching. Her map was my primary tool in writing descriptions of the camp, and her artwork, imitating her writing style, comes across as stark and factual. Written as a diary, not a novel, I cried at the cruelty with which her life unfurled before her. At the same time, however,…

If you love Helga's Diary...

Ad

Book cover of Tap Dancing on Everest: A Young Doctor's Unlikely Adventure

Tap Dancing on Everest by Mimi Zieman,

Tap Dancing on Everest, part coming-of-age memoir, part true-survival adventure story, is about a young medical student, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor raised in N.Y.C., who battles self-doubt to serve as the doctor—and only woman—on a remote Everest climb in Tibet.

The team attempts a new route up…

Want books like Helga's Diary?

Our community of 12,000+ authors has personally recommended 100 books like Helga's Diary.

Browse books like Helga's Diary

Book cover of Les Parisiennes: Resistance, Collaboration, and the Women of Paris Under Nazi Occupation
Book cover of The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler
Book cover of The Nazi Officer's Wife: How One Jewish Woman Survived the Holocaust

Share your top 3 reads of 2024!

And get a beautiful page showing off your 3 favorite reads.

1,881

readers submitted
so far, will you?

Ad

📚 If you like Helga's Diary, you might also like...

Book cover of Pleasure to Purpose

Pleasure to Purpose by Elizabeth B. Splaine,

Part romance/erotica and part family drama, but all heart.

Scarlett loved horses since she was a child, living amidst the chaos of a family ravaged by mental illness. Years later, as she rebuilds a relationship with her often-absent father, she wrangles with needy clients, a manipulative mother, a nosy uncle,…

Book cover of Norvel: An American Hero

Norvel by Kenneth F. Conklin,

NORVEL: An American Hero chronicles the remarkable life of Norvel Lee, a civil rights pioneer and Olympic athlete who challenged segregation in 1948 Virginia. Born in the Blue Ridge Mountains to working-class parents who valued education, Lee overcame Jim Crow laws and a speech impediment to achieve extraordinary success.

He…

5 book lists we think you will like!

Interested in children in the Holocaust, Prague, and the Czech Republic?

Prague 34 books