Unspeakable Prayers is the seventh book in the Thaddeus Murfee series by this author. I have read and reported on all the previous books.
This book, whether as a standalone, or as continuing in the series warrants a five star rating. Unspeakable Prayers is a serious study, in my view, of the interaction between two men, one a Jew, the other an SS Officer in Hitler’s Third Reich. The backdrop of their interaction is the Holocaust, specifically the Treblinka extermination camp.
Lodzi Ashstein, a Polish Jew, was sentenced to Treblinka in 1942. He was 19. While there he encountered Janich Heiss, a member of Hitler’s elite SS, a commandant level officer, authorized by dint of his grade to kill Jews at will. Again, Treblinka, not to be confused, for example with Auschwitz, was an extermination camp which was the reason why Jews were sent there. Auschwitz was a concentration camp peopled by Jews used to labor in the service of the Reich during WWII. As a side note, Tuesday, January 27, 2015 marks the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by the Russians.
I don’t re-tell story lines in my reviews. Suffice it to say, this book is not an apologetic for what occurred at Treblinka. It is, both a serious study of Hitler’s intention to carry out the ultimate solution and, in part, a serious study of the horrors, at times grisly, while never gratuitous, of the treatment that those sent there from among the overall 6 million Jews exterminated during WWII suffered and died at the hands of the German High Command.
While dark, the book is truly a masterful accounting and thought provoking study of how these two individuals behaved in the manner in which they found themselves, either to survive, or eradicate. Both protagonists bring strong character development to the plot which is laid out such that causes one to gasp at times enough to want to put the book down and take a breath, yet doing so raises the risk of losing the moment and thus the momentum of the story.
Make no mistake, Unspeakable Prayers is gripping. It pulls no punches in providing a thorough going analysis of the Holocaust, whose victims suffered inhuman treatment at the hands of the Nazis. Yet, at the same time, Unspeakable Prayers offers up a beacon to the will of the human spirit to survive. To say any more would detract from the point of this review.
Simply put, John Ellsworth has presented a work that is timeless in its importance, which cannot be denied or simply sloughed over. Unspeakable Prayers, is both Man’s unspeakable moment, yet is it also his Prayer in its message for the human spirit.
Tuesday, January 27, 2015
Monday, January 26, 2015
Holocaust Remembrance Day
JANUARY 27, 2015
The UN General Assembly designated January 27—the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau—as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. On this annual day of commemoration, the UN urges every member state to honor the victims of the Nazi era and to develop educational programs to help prevent future genocides.
AUSCHWITZ
The Auschwitz concentration camp complex was the largest of its kind established by the Nazi regime. It included three main camps, all of which deployed incarcerated prisoners at forced labor. One of them also functioned for an extended period as a killing center. The camps were located approximately 37 miles west of Krakow, near the prewar German-Polish border in Upper Silesia, an area that Nazi Germany annexed in 1939 after invading and conquering Poland. The SS authorities established three main camps near the Polish city of Oswiecim: Auschwitz I in May 1940; Auschwitz II (also called Auschwitz-Birkenau) in early 1942; and Auschwitz III (also called Auschwitz-Monowitz) in October 1942.
UNSPEAKABLE PRAYERS
A novel about Lodzi Ashstein, a 19-year-old Jewish boy forced from Warsaw by the Nazis in 1942 to board the cattle train to Treblinka. A novel of evil, survival, overcoming, and hope. A look at one man's life from Treblinka to Chicago and a trial based on the Hate Crimes Act in reverse, for this time a Nazi captain from Treblinka has been murdered. An inquiry into the prevalence of hate toward a people chosen as God's own. The why remains a mystery at the end of the book--you will be asked to draw your own conclusions. Truth be told, there are probably as many conclusions to be drawn as there are readers of this incredible novel.
If you're looking for a novel fitting for Remembrance Day, this novel, released on that day, is suggested.
You will never forget Lodzi Ashstein, I promise you. -- John Ellsworth, January 2015.
The UN General Assembly designated January 27—the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau—as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. On this annual day of commemoration, the UN urges every member state to honor the victims of the Nazi era and to develop educational programs to help prevent future genocides.
AUSCHWITZ
The Auschwitz concentration camp complex was the largest of its kind established by the Nazi regime. It included three main camps, all of which deployed incarcerated prisoners at forced labor. One of them also functioned for an extended period as a killing center. The camps were located approximately 37 miles west of Krakow, near the prewar German-Polish border in Upper Silesia, an area that Nazi Germany annexed in 1939 after invading and conquering Poland. The SS authorities established three main camps near the Polish city of Oswiecim: Auschwitz I in May 1940; Auschwitz II (also called Auschwitz-Birkenau) in early 1942; and Auschwitz III (also called Auschwitz-Monowitz) in October 1942.
UNSPEAKABLE PRAYERS
A novel about Lodzi Ashstein, a 19-year-old Jewish boy forced from Warsaw by the Nazis in 1942 to board the cattle train to Treblinka. A novel of evil, survival, overcoming, and hope. A look at one man's life from Treblinka to Chicago and a trial based on the Hate Crimes Act in reverse, for this time a Nazi captain from Treblinka has been murdered. An inquiry into the prevalence of hate toward a people chosen as God's own. The why remains a mystery at the end of the book--you will be asked to draw your own conclusions. Truth be told, there are probably as many conclusions to be drawn as there are readers of this incredible novel.
If you're looking for a novel fitting for Remembrance Day, this novel, released on that day, is suggested.
You will never forget Lodzi Ashstein, I promise you. -- John Ellsworth, January 2015.
Friday, January 23, 2015
Bookbub Number 5 - In Six Months!
That's right, I just got word yesterday that Bookbub has accepted my discount promo for February 21, 2015. The book is The Defendants, my book number 1. The Kindle Countdown Deal with actually begin February 19 and run for five days, with BB on the third day, the 21st.
What does this mean? For one thing, in my first four Bookbub freebie promos (starting in August 2015 with BB number 1), I have given away free over 170,000 of my books. This has resulted in daily sales in excess of 100/day. Now Bookbub has given me a paid promo, meaning I will get to sell The Defendants at a discount price of .99c and I will receive royalties instead of giving my book away free. Finally, because I have been trying for a paid promo all this time! I am very gratified and thankful this has happened.
Book seven, Unspeakable Prayers, will be released on January 27. If you would like a pre-release copy of this book, please just let me know. I will be happy to send you a free copy. In exchange, if you would leave an Amazon book review next week I would be enormously grateful.
Thanks for reading!
What does this mean? For one thing, in my first four Bookbub freebie promos (starting in August 2015 with BB number 1), I have given away free over 170,000 of my books. This has resulted in daily sales in excess of 100/day. Now Bookbub has given me a paid promo, meaning I will get to sell The Defendants at a discount price of .99c and I will receive royalties instead of giving my book away free. Finally, because I have been trying for a paid promo all this time! I am very gratified and thankful this has happened.
Book seven, Unspeakable Prayers, will be released on January 27. If you would like a pre-release copy of this book, please just let me know. I will be happy to send you a free copy. In exchange, if you would leave an Amazon book review next week I would be enormously grateful.
Thanks for reading!
Friday, January 16, 2015
Unspeakable Prayers
When even the angels had to turn aside their faces and wish they had not seen. When even the angels could not tell what they had heard. Unspeakable prayers, the seventh of the Thaddeus Murfee books, is coming in the next week. Right now the book is out for edits and beta reads, and will be published once all that good stuff is completed.
This weekend my wife is reading the book. She's usually a pretty good indicator for me. This book is going to be one I've waited and wanted all my life to write: it is, as Hollywood is wont to say, sprawling. Covering WWII and after, the history is broad histoscape that takes in so much of Poland, Germany, and America, where the virulent disease of Nazi Germany can still rear its head and ask to be heard. Witness even the latest round of rallies going on in Germany this past week. The world has changed so much since 1942, but has man really changed?
Which is what this book is all about. It deals with the kind of hatred most of us never know: that hatred of a people or a race that isn't subject to any kind of empathy or forgiveness (for what, God only knows) of the people who are members of that hated race or group. In writing this book, I have studied the historians, read the first-person accounts, considered the economic, religious, and political realities of pre- and post- and still cannot conceive how one group, the Nazis, could so loath another, the Jews, that it would try to eradicate them from the earth.
Pick up this book and read it, please. It is my best work and it's the book that will always make me feel like my life was worth living, after all.
After all the pain and loss and all the rest of it, Unspeakable Prayers can exist as my prayer.
This weekend my wife is reading the book. She's usually a pretty good indicator for me. This book is going to be one I've waited and wanted all my life to write: it is, as Hollywood is wont to say, sprawling. Covering WWII and after, the history is broad histoscape that takes in so much of Poland, Germany, and America, where the virulent disease of Nazi Germany can still rear its head and ask to be heard. Witness even the latest round of rallies going on in Germany this past week. The world has changed so much since 1942, but has man really changed?
Which is what this book is all about. It deals with the kind of hatred most of us never know: that hatred of a people or a race that isn't subject to any kind of empathy or forgiveness (for what, God only knows) of the people who are members of that hated race or group. In writing this book, I have studied the historians, read the first-person accounts, considered the economic, religious, and political realities of pre- and post- and still cannot conceive how one group, the Nazis, could so loath another, the Jews, that it would try to eradicate them from the earth.
Pick up this book and read it, please. It is my best work and it's the book that will always make me feel like my life was worth living, after all.
After all the pain and loss and all the rest of it, Unspeakable Prayers can exist as my prayer.
Monday, January 12, 2015
First Year, Seventh Book
Well, it's almost over--my first year as a published author. During that year I wrote and published six books and wrote a seventh, now undergoing final reads and edits. Here is what has happened to me this first year out.
I have sold 30,000 books and given away 170,000 books. That's right, I discovered Bookbub about halfway into my first year and made submissions. Of my book, The Defendants. It was offered for free and it had right at 50,000 downloads in two days. Three more freebie Bookbubs followed. All told, 170,000 books downloaded. Results: 30,000 sales, probably directly attributable to the giveaways.
At least I think. To be very honest, I don't know how it happened. Here's some history.
I have been writing for publication since 1967 when I wrote my first novel. I published in 2014. That's quite a dry spell, you might say. Some might be inclined to quit. But after serial rejections in the hundreds, I kept writing. Because writing is like my therapy. It's the one place where I can be my best self. My books say who I am. My collection of short stories say who I am. They tell anyone who wishes to know, how I think, how I speak, how my mind works--all of that. But most important, my books tell stories. That's right. I see myself wholly as an entertainer. If this writing of mine is art then I missed that part of the definition when I took humanities in college. We were taught that art is found mostly in France, Italy, and Greece, and we were taught that art might very well take up years of lying on your back and painting ceilings. Doesn't even come close to my experience with my seven books.
See, I first published in 2014 when I was 72 years old. That's right. During that same year I had cataract surgery on both eyes and had back surgery (spinal ablation) when the osteoarthritis got so bad I couldn't stand upright without spasms. So I did the next best thing: I sat. I retired from my law practice and I sat. I got bored, so I bought a Macbook. The heavens parted: I love that computer. So one night I wrote my first sentence of my first novel. And then my life came gushing out in these 500,000 words. More and more, as if it was feeding on itself, the stories refused to stop coming out.
So, I did what a blind invalid should do: I wrote them down. And put them on Amazon. And people bought them.
Today I sell around 150 books a day. That's after one year. Now I can see again 20/20, and I can stand up again. But I'm still sitting with the little laptop propped on my lap in my dilapidated chair that my wife explains is the root cause of both back and vision problems. Somehow...they're connected, the health problems and the chair, as only a spouse can make those connections for you. Anyway, that's a whole other book, one I doubt I'll write.
My main character is a young lawyer named Thaddeus Murfee. Much of what happens to him actually happened to me while I was practicing law. Equally true, much of what happens to him did not happen to me, thank heavens. Thaddeus has several more careers coming at him down the road. Stay tuned.
Year two looks like it will be lively.
I have sold 30,000 books and given away 170,000 books. That's right, I discovered Bookbub about halfway into my first year and made submissions. Of my book, The Defendants. It was offered for free and it had right at 50,000 downloads in two days. Three more freebie Bookbubs followed. All told, 170,000 books downloaded. Results: 30,000 sales, probably directly attributable to the giveaways.
At least I think. To be very honest, I don't know how it happened. Here's some history.
I have been writing for publication since 1967 when I wrote my first novel. I published in 2014. That's quite a dry spell, you might say. Some might be inclined to quit. But after serial rejections in the hundreds, I kept writing. Because writing is like my therapy. It's the one place where I can be my best self. My books say who I am. My collection of short stories say who I am. They tell anyone who wishes to know, how I think, how I speak, how my mind works--all of that. But most important, my books tell stories. That's right. I see myself wholly as an entertainer. If this writing of mine is art then I missed that part of the definition when I took humanities in college. We were taught that art is found mostly in France, Italy, and Greece, and we were taught that art might very well take up years of lying on your back and painting ceilings. Doesn't even come close to my experience with my seven books.
See, I first published in 2014 when I was 72 years old. That's right. During that same year I had cataract surgery on both eyes and had back surgery (spinal ablation) when the osteoarthritis got so bad I couldn't stand upright without spasms. So I did the next best thing: I sat. I retired from my law practice and I sat. I got bored, so I bought a Macbook. The heavens parted: I love that computer. So one night I wrote my first sentence of my first novel. And then my life came gushing out in these 500,000 words. More and more, as if it was feeding on itself, the stories refused to stop coming out.
So, I did what a blind invalid should do: I wrote them down. And put them on Amazon. And people bought them.
Today I sell around 150 books a day. That's after one year. Now I can see again 20/20, and I can stand up again. But I'm still sitting with the little laptop propped on my lap in my dilapidated chair that my wife explains is the root cause of both back and vision problems. Somehow...they're connected, the health problems and the chair, as only a spouse can make those connections for you. Anyway, that's a whole other book, one I doubt I'll write.
My main character is a young lawyer named Thaddeus Murfee. Much of what happens to him actually happened to me while I was practicing law. Equally true, much of what happens to him did not happen to me, thank heavens. Thaddeus has several more careers coming at him down the road. Stay tuned.
Year two looks like it will be lively.
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