The Umbrella Maker's Son

A Novel of WWII

De: Tod Lending

Narrado por: Fred Berman

"This powerful, heart-wrenching novel follows a young Polish Jew through his incredible journey to escape the Nazis. Reuven’s story typifies that of millions of others experiencing the horrors and deprivations suffered by Jews in WWII and those who tried to help them. And yet, it is also an ultimately uplifting and inspiring tale of one man’s coming of age in horrific times."—Heather Morris, #1 bestselling author of The Tattooist of Auschwitz

For fans of Heather Morris and Lisa Barr, a powerful and unforgettable novel of survival against all odds and the remarkable power of love, in which a Jewish teenager in World War II Poland fights to save his life and find the young woman who holds his heart.

Born to a secure, middle-class Polish Jewish family, seventeen-year-old Reuven works alongside his father, an artisan businessman whose shop creates the finest handmade umbrellas in Poland. But the family’s peaceful life shatters when the Nazis invade their homeland, igniting World War II. With terrifying brutality, the Nazis confiscate their business, evict them from their home, and strip away their rights, threatening the lives of the city’s Jewish population, including Reuven and Zelda, the girl he loves.

Shortly after the Nazi occupation, Zelda and her family disappear, and Reuven and his father are forced into backbreaking physical labor that nearly kills them. For the young man and his family, the only chance to survive is escape—and some of them will die trying.

Fleeing a Nazi ambush through the surrounding forest, shot and wounded, Reuven is found by a local farmer who has never met a Jew—and agrees to help because he needs the boy to work the farm with him. The farmer’s wife, however, is not as kind. Her betrayal forces a desperate Reuven to escape. He embarks on a perilous journey through the Polish countryside, determined to reach the Kraków ghetto where he hopes to reunite with Zelda, whose life has also been forever changed by the horrors of occupation and war.

A love story and a story of family, The Umbrella Maker’s Son is a riveting, heartfelt, and beautiful tale of survival and unexpected hope in the face of terror and violence. A chronicle of triumph, it joins the ranks of The Tattooist of Auschwitz and other memorable works of modern Holocaust literature.

©2025 Tod Lending (P)2025 HarperCollins Publishers

Unbelievable sacrifices

Love real life stories …. Z c g h h g g h h h h h

WW2 tragedy told beautifully

One of the most heartfelt detailed stories I've read on the tragic, senseless, crime of the Germans.
Told in such detail.

SO BEAUTIFULLY TOLD, BUT THE SENSELESSNESS IS SO HARD TO COMPREHEND…

This story was beautifully told, but the senselessness, the injustice of what happened to the Jews, is just so hard for me to understand.

Of all the books I’ve read (listened to) on this subject, this one was by far the most realistic to me.

I will NEVER understand how so many German men, converted to Nazi soldiers, could be trained to be so heartless and ruthless; men who in a previous life, held ordinary positions in society.

How does one go from being an ordinary citizen to someone who cannot see the pain and hurt in others and become ruthless killers? The true Nazis saw only “Jews,” not human beings. (There were many who chose to help however they could — I don’t mean to imply all Austrians and Germans were bad).

How does one crazy Austrian
(Hitler) convince an entire ARMY that it’s not only ACCEPTABLE, but DESIRABLE, to wipe out a whole segment of society without even a moment of hesitation or remorse? I can barely squash a bug — a human being? Not it my very own life depended on it…

This story’s characters were so realistic to me that they felt like members of my own family. So many unspeakable things were done to the very young, the elderly, the handicapped. I’m SO glad I was born almost two decades after all this senseless killing occurred.

Throughout the story, I kept waiting for ONE good thing to happen to the main character. By the end, following his story left me spent. Everyone he had ever loved — gone. How do you survive that and go on?

This was an extraordinary book; one that makes the reader feel as if they are there in the midst of what was happening at the time.

The hardest part to accept is that the are many who survived the Holocaust who actually LIVED this very story.

I recommend this book to anyone who has an interest in this time period, but I warn you…this story is hard to hear in many places.

This book made me pray that those who were part of the killing machine have faced Judgment Day, and all those who were killed during this time have found eternal PEACE. May God rest their souls.