“A work of awful, heartbreaking, tragic suspense. A book of the decade, easily, and likely a book of the century.”

“An immensely human tableau in which each witness has a face and each face a story and destiny…rigorous in its search for truth, at once tender and exacting.”

“An excellent memoir…brings to life the struggle of an entire generation.”

“Beautiful and powerfully moving…As suspenseful as a detective thriller and as difficult to put down.”

“Moving…Proves that there are limitless ways of looking at that most inexplicable of human moments.”

“A memorable, insightful book about what can be tragically lost—and ultimately, with persistence, found.”

“[With] a spectacular trail of discoveries, disappointments, and staggering coincidences…Mendelsohn constructs an artful, looping narrative that includes elaborate digressions…The technique pays off, showing how the Holocaust continues to affect people who had no direct experience of it.”

“Both memoir and history, an ambitious and gorgeously meditative detective story that takes him across the globe in search of the lost threads of these few almost forgotten lives.”

“A magnificent and deeply wise book…Mesmerizing…Mendelsohn’s accomplishment is enormous.”

“[Mendelsohn] is a brilliant storyteller.”

“Stunning….A work of major significance and pummeling impact.”

“One of the book’s most striking elements is the author’s recounting of the book of Genesis in parallel with his own story, highlighting eternal themes of origins and family, temptation and exile, brotherly betrayal, creation and annihilation.”

“A classicist and formidable literary critic, Mendelsohn performs extraordinary feats of factual and emotional excavation in this finely wrought, many-faceted narrative, a work best described as Talmudic…Mendelsohn’s tenacious yet artistic, penetrating, and empathic work of remembrance recalibrates our perception of the Holocaust and of human nature.”

“A forceful meditation touching on loss, memory, Jewishness, and the vagaries of chance in human life.”