An extraordinary tale, cinematic and historically painstaking.
A biography of Walraven Van Hall, a central figure in the Dutch Resistance to German occupation during World War II.
Born in 1906, Walraven Van Hall enjoyed a “sunny childhood”—the sixth of 10 siblings, he was raised by a family as wealthy as it was loving. His life and the lives of his Dutch countrymen, however, were threatened by the sudden Nazi invasion in 1940. A banker and a broker, Van Hall became an active member of the Dutch Union, a political party that welcomed moderates who were neither revolutionary communists nor conservatives slow to commit to any plan of action against the German occupation. The party’s official stance against underground resistance gave it cover to fight the Nazis. As author Schaap puts it in this marvelous blend of scholarly rigor and gripping drama: “The Dutch Union was a precursor of, and catalyst for, a fortified Resistance.” Van Hall’s war efforts began modestly, raising funds for the families of seamen who lost their income when they refused to sail for the Nazis. Within a year, though, he was managing large amounts of money to support the Resistance and to help find safe lodging for Jews. Appropriating all this money required extraordinary secrecy and ingenuity. At one point, desperate for cash, Van Hall orchestrated a sophisticated heist of the Dutch State Bank. The author powerfully portrays Van Hall’s indefatigable efforts, which exacted a terrible toll on his physical and mental health and eventually led to his arrest and execution. The Dutch Resistance was the best funded of its kind in Europe, and Schaap lucidly explains its complex inner machinations. Also, this is an emotionally wrenching tale conveyed in moving prose. Just before his execution, Van Hall hid a note to his family in his underwear, assuming it would be sent back to them: “Oh dearest, what a good time we had together these 13 years. I know, thank God, you are surrounded by loving family and friends. It has cost me a lot of struggle, but I am willing to accept the worst.” The translation by Marlin is graceful, and his introduction to the volume edifying. This is an important contribution to the scholarship on the underground Dutch Resistance to the Nazis.
An extraordinary tale, cinematic and historically painstaking.Pub Date: Feb. 12, 2024
ISBN: 9781963632026
Page Count: 300
Publisher: Boissevain Books
Review Posted Online: April 30, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Suffering unfathomable anguish, a mother memorializes her murdered son with great tenderness.
Remembering “Hershy.”
Three hundred and twenty-eight days. That’s how long Hersh Goldberg-Polin was held in captivity—tortured and starved by his captors in underground tunnels—before he was executed. He was 23 years old. In this unvarnished and heartrending account, Goldberg-Polin’s mother, Rachel, writes of the unending torment that she and her husband, Jon, endured after learning that their son had been kidnapped by Hamas terrorists during the attacks of October 7, 2023. Like so many other young people on that day, Hersh was attending a music festival in Israel—a celebration of love and unity. As Goldberg-Polin writes, her son was “the only American citizen kidnapped alive on October 7th who did not return alive.” In direct, plainspoken language that steers clear of politics, the author, a Jewish educator, recounts “being in a daze of the most indescribably sickening horror and fear, like nothing I had ever felt in my life. I remember my heart racing and feeling like I was in a permanent state of someone scaring me.” In addition to “shovel[ing] out my pain in the form of words,” she shares reminiscences of her son, as well as details that only a parent could notice. “His eyes were cookies,” she says of her “Hershy.” “I couldn’t find the pupils within the dark chocolate-brown irises.…He had a raspy voice, even when he was a baby.” And: “I thought he was hilarious; his sarcasm and humor were similar to mine.” Hersh and his sisters, Leebie and Orly, adapted well to life in Israel after the family moved from Richmond, Virginia. (Hersh was born in the Bay Area.) After being discharged from his service in the Israeli army as a combat medic, he was planning to journey around the world—a longtime dream of his. “So many people have come to love you, Hersh,” Jon Polin writes in the book’s afterword. And with one simple word that has the power to touch any heart, he signs off: “Dada.”
Suffering unfathomable anguish, a mother memorializes her murdered son with great tenderness.Pub Date: April 21, 2026
ISBN: 9798217198009
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: April 21, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2026
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
