This book is the story of Antonina Zabinski and her husband, son and the many people and animals they protected, helped and who helped them through World War II in Warsaw, Poland, and a few villages surrounding that area.
The book starts by telling about the Zabinski’s life before the Germans invaded Poland, the animals they raised and cared for and how the animals were often part of the family, even sharing the house. When the war came to Warsaw, their zoo was torn apart. Some animals were shot, some escaped, some set free and others taken by a German zookeeper.
As the animals left the zoo, Jewish friends came to hide. Some hid in the house and others in the animal enclosures. Antonina and her husband, Jan, hid many people, helped many others escape and helped feed others still in the ghetto. Jan was active in the resistance, continually trying to thwart, poison and sabotage the German occupiers.
It is a true story and I listened to the audio book rather than reading the print copy, and I was glad I did. Having someone read the detail-oriented parts to me rather than having to read those often tedious lists. I thought the author did a good job of sticking to the real story and not fictionalizing much, which had it pros and cons. The biggest disadvantage being that real life is often boring.
A few of Ackerman’s descriptions got ridiculously long such as the list of beetles in the collection left in their care during the war was one example and the description of the lamp shop Antonina and her son stayed in for a time is another. When I mentioned to my sister, who read the print copy of the book this month, that I thought the beetle list was too much, she confessed she had skipped over it.
Another advantage to listening to this book was the pronunciations. I was looking through the print copy prior to writing this and I never would have said the Polish names correctly -- not even close.
The story of the Zabinski’s and their efforts during the war was great, I would highly recommend it. I haven’t read any other Holocaust stories told from Poland and I thought learning more about their struggles in Warsaw was very interesting. It was interesting to see how many people resisted, hid Jews, helped Jews and the resistance and the numerous others who were just willing to look the other way when they saw something out of the ordinary rather than turning in their neighbors.
The Nazi’s efforts to “purify” more than the human bloodline was interesting as well, I never knew that they tried to “purify” animals and plants as well.
I thought the resolution was very gratifying, I like knowing that most of the people Antonina and Jan helped survived the war and to know that they impacted so many lives for good.
In all, I found this an inspirational story and would recommend it to anyone interested in learning more on this topic or just interested in reading a story about people striving to do the right thing.
Some questions to think about:
Did this give you a different view of Poland during World War II than you had before?
Can you imagine yourself in Antonina and Jan’s position? Do you think you could have done what they did?
Do you agree with the Zabinski’s method of raising animals and children together and in the same home? Do you think animals should be treated as members of the family?
I look forward to discussing this book with you!
Our book for November is "Cane River" by Lalita Tademy.
