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The Boy Who Followed His Father into Auschwitz

The Number One Sunday Times Bestseller

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The Boy Who Followed His Father into Auschwitz

By: Jeremy Dronfield
Narrated by: John Sackville
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About this listen

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of The Boy Who Followed His Father into Auschwitz by Jeremy Dronfield, read by John Sackville.

In 1939, Gustav Kleinmann, a Jewish upholsterer in Vienna, was seized by the Nazis. Along with his teenage son, Fritz, he was sent to Buchenwald in Germany. There began an unimaginable ordeal that saw the pair beaten, starved and forced to build the very concentration camp they were held in.

When Gustav was set to be transferred to Auschwitz, a certain death sentence, Fritz refused to leave his side. Throughout the horrors they witnessed and the suffering they endured, there was one constant that kept them alive: the love between father and son.

Based on Gustav's secret diary and meticulous archive research, this book tells his and Fritz's story for the first time - a story of courage and survival unparalleled in the history of the Holocaust.

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Critic Reviews

An emotionally devastating story of courage - and survival
An extraordinary tale
The almost unbelievable true story of Fritz Kleinman, who volunteered to follow his father, Gustav, into Auschwitz. It's a terrible and dramatic account of the humiliations and evils suffered by Jews in concentration camps and a moving testimony to the bond between fathers and sons
The inspiring true story of Gustav and Fritz Kleinmann, an Austrian father and son who managed to survive internments in concentration camps from Buchenwald to Auschwitz. Dronfield draws extensively on Gustav's diary, allowing us inside the incredible bond between father and son that kept them together through harrowing experiences, and, like all the best narrative nonfiction, the story is both immersive and extraordinary. Deeply moving and brimming with humanity.
A deeply humane account. This book could not be more timely and deserves the widest possible readership
An absolutely extraordinary story. It is the greatest father and son story I've ever come across in my life
Extraordinary
We should all read this shattering book about the Holocaust. An astonishing story of the unbreakable bond between a father and a son. Brilliantly researched and written with searing clarity
An extraordinary tale of endurance and filial love. It is a miraculous story with many twists and Dronfield tells it well in an energetic and lively style
A unique story of defiance and hope amid the genocide
All stars
Most relevant
Set in the context of the relentless, unthinkable inhumanity and evil perpetrated on an extraordinary, industrial scale by the Nazi machine, this is not only an astonishing story of survival, but an account of how humanity, resistance, ingenuity, decency, hope and dignity among otherwise ordinary people can combine to prevail over the murderous indifference of a brutal regime. A poignant and confronting story of extreme hardship and unmitigated cruelty that is ultimately uplifting and inspiring.

A Profoundly Moving Story, Beautifully Written, Magnificently Read

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This book has been brilliantly written, written in a way that makes it extremely vivid. It is a powerful and often uncomfortable true story that deserves to be read and remembered.

brilliantly written

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Absolutely amazing book, highly recommend everyone to “read” this book. Well worth it, such an amazing journey

Heart wrenching

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Possibly the best holocaust book (14 so far) that I have listened too. The unbelievable detail of places, events, names due to Gustav’s diary guarded with his life for over five years seven months of hell.

“They took their past with the understanding that the living must gather the memories of the dead and carry them into the safety of the future.”

A must read/listen.

Gustav and Fritz Kleinmann “outlasted the people who had tried to destroy them”

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A heart warming story agood storyline..One of strength and determination of survival. plus the evil people can inflicted on other without regard

good read

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