The Nazi Officer's Wife

I have mostly read novels and only a couple of nonfiction books about WWII but this might be the first memoir. It doesn't really talk about concentration camps and atrocities committed on the prisoners but about the human side of the survivors and people who helped them on the way.

Edith is from a loving Jewish family in Vienna studying to be a lawyer. When the Nazi's come, she is denied her degree, forced out of her home into a ghetto and finally sent to labor camp. She works almost eighty hour work weeks while starving and her only hope being the letters and packages that she received from her mom and Pepi. After her mother is deported to Poland, she refuses to report to the authorities and after managing to secure false papers, moves to Munich. There she meets a Nazi party member Werner who falls in love with her and they get married.

There were some comments about Edith's life that demeaned her for surviving as a German Nazi wife. But that's the whole point of this book. In times of war, when living is the only matter of concern, is it really worth it to judge a woman for setting up a false identity and surviving under the enemy's nose. Edith is a smart, intelligent woman who is deprived of everything – her education, dignity, a future, even basic food and shelter – and when all doors close for her freedom, she chooses the one way that she finds. She lives in constant fear of being caught, every minute of her existence, but still manages to carve out a life and family for herself. She suppresses her witty intelligent personality to become a meek submissive wife of a Nazi because all she wants is to live; because that's the only thing she has left. Finally, when the occupation ends, she gets a chance to resume her true identity, even become a lawyer and judge to help the people who have lost everything in the war.

But this book is not just about Edith. It's about all the people who chose to help her. Her friend Christl, a German who gave Edith her original papers at great peril to herself. Maria Niedarall, another German who provided her all the encouragement and resources to escape. Pepi, her eternal love whose letters provided her great relief and hope during the whole ordeal before her escape. Even Werner in some ways helps her because despite being his aggressive self and knowing Edith's truth, he never betrays her.

This book is about humanity – how seemingly good people can turn their backs on friends for personal safety and well-being while at the same time, people from unexpected quarters risk their lives to help their fellow citizens. I think this book is a must read for anyone who thinks living in wartime and surviving is a black and white. Because it is most definitely not.