Endless: A Novel of Holocaust Survivors

Description

288 pages
$24.95
ISBN 0-921842-51-1
DDC C813'.54

Author

Year

1997

Contributor

Reviewed by June M. Blurton

June M. Blurton is a retired speech/language pathologist.

Review

Roma Karsh’s parents were survivors of Nazi concentration camps. Their
stories of the atrocities committed in the camps form the basis of this
novel about the Holocaust and its effect on the lives of three people:
Josh and Sarah, a brother and sister from a well-to-do Jewish family in
Poland, who become separated after their parents are sent to a camp; and
Elfie, an aristocratic Prussian girl. A Christian family hides Sarah
from the Gestapo for four years. Eventually, she marries, has a
daughter, and emigrates to Israel. Josh is put into a concentration
camp, but manages to survive and is rescued by Elfie at the end of the
war. At the time of the rescue, Elfie is living in an SS maternity home,
a place where young Aryan women give birth to babies as part of
Hitler’s efforts to build a master race. Both Elfie and Josh
eventually emigrate to Canada.

Endless deals less with the camps than with the effects of the
Holocaust on the survivors. Although Karsh’s characters experience
rage, anguish, and guilt, they never really come alive. As well, the
story is frequently bogged down by an excess of run-on sentences.

Citation

Karsh, Roma., “Endless: A Novel of Holocaust Survivors,” Canadian Book Review Annual Online, accessed November 1, 2024, https://cbra.library.utoronto.ca/items/show/2870.