Jul 29, 2003 | 320 Pages
A San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of the Year
“Purely imaginative . . . [Murphy’s] characters speak to us with terrible prescience.”
—The New York Times Book Review
“Filled with the breathtaking, sometimes death-defying contortions of war.”
—Los Angeles Times
“This harrowing portrayal of the daily ordeal of Poles caught up in the German occupation—Gentiles as well as Jews—makes this a page-turner as well as a moving testament to the human will to do good and survive despite all odds. Highly recommended.”
—Library Journal
“It’s the scariet of all fairy tales, and it’s retold here with gripping realism. . . . The Grimms’ story is always there like a dark shadow intensifying the drama as the searing narrative transforms the old archetypes.”
—Booklist
“A provocative transformation of the classic fairy tale into a haunting survival story set in Poland during WWII. No reader who picks up this inspiring novel will put it down until the final pages, in which redemption is not a fairy tale ending but a heartening message of hope.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Unusually gripping . . . Lyrical, haunting, unforgettable.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
