Digging

Have you ever really thought about your ancestors – beyond their names and dates of events in their lives? The stories of how they lived their lives can be a source of strength as well as inspiration in your own life.

In this new work of narrative nonfiction, Susan M. Rostan invites us to experience her journey as she seeks to uncover the story of her husband’s family, including two courageous but silent survivors of WWII’s Warsaw Ghetto: her mother-in-law Elzbieta and Elzbieta’s brother, Marian Rosenbloom.

With the passing of Elzbieta, an aging Uncle Marian is the only surviving link to his family’s history -- the stories of tragic loss and heroic survival -- that he and his sister had refused to share with anyone throughout their life. Encouraged by the author and driven by an emerging sense of responsibility to his sister’s namesake and future generations, Marian begins a difficult journey into the memories of his childhood in the Warsaw Ghetto and subsequent survival.

As his experiences unfold, he haltingly recalls how he managed to escape the Ghetto and survive, thanks to his courageous rescuers. Out of his remembrances, the author nurtures not only the story of her husband’s family history, but finds herself immersed in an insistent desire to honor Marian’s rescuers. Through her poignant and compelling narrative, she revives Elzbieta’s legacy of hope, caring, and laughter for all of us to share.