Amos Lassen Review of "In God's Silence" ( which is my 1st book)

Amos Lassen was very kind to not only read my book, but to write a wonderful review about my book "In God's Silence".  If you would like to see Amos's original post you can do so at:

http://reviewsbyamoslassen.com/?p=29154 

 Also feel free to leave feed back on his blog, as well as well.  Thank you so  much Amos.

“In God’s Silence” by Charles J. Dale— One Man’s Journey

Dale, Charles J. “In God’s Silence”, Create Space, 2014.

One Man’s Journey

Amos Lassen

We can never forget what it was like during World War II for gay people  but sometimes we do because we are so staggered by the number of Jews that were killed as a result of Nazi Germany. Many gay people suffered the same fate. This is the story of Christoph Baecker who was arrested because of his homosexuality as Paragraph 175 outlined how gays were to be done away with. Baecker was arrested and was to be sent to Auschwitz but miraculously before his departure he found love. We can only imagine what happens, what the war did to that romance and we naturally wonder how was it that he survived.

Charles Dale spent a great deal of time researching the topic of homosexuality in wartime Germany and was inspired to do so by the death of Rudolph Brazda, the last known gay survivor of the Nazi horror and concentration camps.  We are at a bit of a loss for literature about the treatment of gays and this affected me personally about two years ago when I attended the service for gays who died in the camps during Pride Week in Boston. Being Jewish myself, I am quite familiar with what went on during the Holocaust but I was quite surprised when the religious leaders, a Rabbi and A Universalist Unitarian minister read testimony of Jews during a service to honor gay people. I politely approached them and explained that we had just recently observed Holocaust Memorial Day by which we remembered and honored Jews that were exterminated and asked why there were no testimonies from gays. The rabbi was quite agitated and asked me why I was trying to change the way that they have done things for years when the minister chimed in and said that she was not aware of anything being available. At this point I told her of some of the items that I had in my personal library and while not a lot, I offered to send her a detailed bibliography. I never heard back and when I attended the service the following year nothing had changed. This year she will have a copy of this book in her hands and lets see if she dares to use and if the Rabbi still thinks of me an agitator. Incidentally at the Boston Holocaust Memorial there is a special plaque for the gays that were killed.

I am hoping that Dale’s book will cause more to be interested in the topic and perhaps we will get more insight into what went on. (If you have not seen the movie “Bent”, you should). This is Dale’s attempt to bring an awareness of the lack of literature and the hope that there will be more even though what is available is limited.

Having lived in Israel, I have known more than my share of those who managed to live through the horrors but again those were Jews. Most do not want to talk about what they went through because it is so painful to do so. With gays it is even more difficult because it would mean a public acknowledgement of their sexuality and at the time that they were captured this was not done. It’s a different time now and while there are few survivors left, maybe someone will be inspired to come forward.

One of the unique things that Charles Dale has done is to invent dialogue which I am sure came to him as he did his research and while the words we read might not be the ones that were actually spoken, I can guess that they are pretty close. Of course, this is not an easy book to read as most Holocaust books are not but they do give us a catalyst to let go of feeling. This is a tragic personal story that is packed with emotion about a time we know a lot about with the exception of the treatment of gay people.

Dale has a wonderful knack for language and parts of this book are as lyrical as poetry and extremely sensitive. I find it hard to describe how I felt as I read yet I know this is a book a subject we should know about and therefore this book should be read. I am amazed at the quality of this as a first novel. Here is a story that we wish would never have happened but since it did, it is a story that must be told. I fell in love with some of the characters and even tried to put myself in their places wondering how I would react and what would I do. It was as if I found a family that was taken from me.