Tatae's Promise

Based on the True Story of a Young Woman’s Escape from Auschwitz

By: Sherry Maysonave, Moises J. Goldman

Narrated by: Brittany Wilkerson

Tatae’s Promise: You will live… You will tell Internationally acclaimed. 13 Awards.

Inspired by a never-before-told, true story of a young woman's escape from Auschwitz with her sister, Tatae’s Promise is an extraordinary narrative of unimaginable courage, family, faith and enduring love. Experience Hinda’s breathtaking life as it transforms from living in a happy home, to banishment to a ghetto, to prison, to the Auschwitz death camp, to escape, and then miraculously rebuilding her life. In 1940, Hinda was eighteen years old when an axe crashed through the front door of her home in Poland. Nazi soldiers swarmed inside, herded the family into an army truck and hauled them away for one reason: They were Jews. After thirty-two months of subsisting on a starvation diet, sleeping on a wooden floor in the Mlawa ghetto, Hinda was deported to Auschwitz.

When incarcerated there for an additional two years, Hinda endured rabid hunger, slave labor, life threatening diseases, and barbarous brutalities while clinging to her father’s promise: “I know for certain that you will live, and you will tell.” These twelve words—a powerful presage written by her father, Tatae, in a letter to Hinda mere hours before the Gestapo murdered him—fueled her will to persevere. Incredibly, at the age of twenty-three, Hinda devised a daring plot to escape the exhaustively guarded gates of Auschwitz with her younger sister, Rachel. Hinda brilliantly executed the plan only to find the two of them running for their lives—from both Germans and Russians.

According to the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, there are less than two hundred documented, successful “prisoner escapes” from Auschwitz-Birkenau. Most of them were men. Hinda and Rachel’s victorious escape was truly remarkable.

©2022 Sherry Maysonave and Moises J. Goldman (P)2025 Sherry Maysonave and Moises J. Goldman

The grace under pressure.

This deeply tragic tale well told by our narrator is marbled throughout with warm humor, fierce love and daring courage.

A must read for everyone

The story of Hinda a young polish girl and her family during the terrifying years of persecution and oppression against the Judaica during World War II by the Nazis. The fact she and her sister escaped from Aushwitz is astounding as is the length of time the survived that Nazi death camp.

The strength of Tatae’s daughter

I’ve never listened to a 23+ hour book before, but I couldn’t stop listening to this one. The author’s words captivated from the beginning, and the narrator made me feel I was there. I finished listening to this book in about four days. For me, that’s how good a story the author captured in the daughter’s tapes—I needed to know how this story ended. I highly recommend this book. It will transport you!!

The Love of family through extraordinarily horrific time in history

I fell in love with this book! The audible narrator takes you into the story until it’s hard to take a break from listening. This is a real life experience by this family and is written masterfully. This book needs to be in everyone’s personal library and should be required reading for High School. In the world we live in today it’s scary to think we could repeat this history unless people become the voice to say NO! Every human being is a soul that belongs to God.
Melissa Charba