history / europe / eastern

The devastating story of Poland's Jedwabne during World War II, which was the basis of Jan Gross's controversial Neighbors (2001). Based on the author's encounters with witnesses, survivors, murderers, and their helpers between 2000 and 2004, this book raises important questions about the responsibility of Poles for the Holocaust and about how the 1,600 Jewish inhabitants died in Jedwabne.

The author is a relief worker and child psychiatrist who interviewed over forty Serb and Muslim children who came of age during the Bosnian War in the 1990's. She returned twenty years later to discover the adults they have become. Their poignant stories illuminate the resilience of the human spirit.