Book overview
Selma Wijnberg is a criminal, a prisoner. Because she is Jewish. For this crime, in the depths of Hitler's occupation of Holland, Selma is deported to the Sobibor death camp, sentenced to sort the clothes of the dead while a smoke made of thousands blackens the sky. And in the light of this enormous funeral pyre, at the end of a Nazi pistol, Selma is ordered to dance. The hand that offers to dance with her is strong. Steady. It belongs to Chaim Engel. Chaim is a Polish Jew and also a prisoner. Chaim and Selma don't speak the same language. But sometimes, love doesn't need a language.
Who falls in love in the middle of hell? Chaim and Selma do. And who knew that love could kindle so much hope.
But when the prisoners of Sobibor hatch a daring plan of escape, it is time to kill or be killed. The gate or the fire. Chaim and Selma will go out on their feet, or out with the smoke. In an hour of terror and panic, of bullets and bloodshed, Chaim and Selma discover that hope--and two hands twined tightly together--can be the key to keeping two people alive.
Based on the remarkable true story of Selma Wijnberg and Chaim Engel, and the infamous revolt and escape of the Sobibor death camp prisoners, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Light in Hidden Places, Sharon Cameron crafts an extraordinary and evocative thriller that celebrates how hope and love can conquer even the most impossible of odds.
