[.ca] True Story Of Hansel And Gretel (ISBN 0142003077)

capturing:
I have always been a rebel against the fairytales where the men always rescue a helpless princess, the dragon gets slain, the stepmother is evil, and the ï¿1/2goodï¿1/2 wind up rich in the end. So when I walked into the store and saw ï¿1/2The True Story of Hansel and Gretelï¿1/2 I was compelled to give the well known story of a selfish stepmother and foolish children another try. Once I turned the first page I was caught up in a story that I knew was not all fairytale. The book takes place in the last months of the Nazi occupation of Poland. The children are abandoned in a forest to find safety, and have to give up their Jewish names for Hansel and Gretel. The children stumble upon Magda, who the villagers refer to as ï¿1/2 the witchï¿1/2. She takes them in and is determined to save them from the Germans controlling the village. Meanwhile the story flashes back to the father and the stepmother as they struggle to survive. I wouldnï¿1/2t or couldnï¿1/2t put this book down until I was finished. The book followed the tale of Hansel and Gretel, but is far from the sugar-coated version told to children. Louise Murphy has a talent of making people come alive to the reader. Although the outcome of the book is not the one of money and happiness, the pages turned quickly as the plot twisted and captured me more by the second. I would recommend this book to people who want to know what the holocaust really was all about, not just the evil of the Nazis, but the people who had the will to live through it.

Words cannot describe the feelings this book gave meý:
Every child knows the story of Hansel and Gretel, the two children abandoned in the woods by their father and evil stepmother, who eventually discover the witch's hut. What if the story was real? In this incredible novel by Louise Murphy the story is changed slightly, but the main elements are still there: the evil stepmother, the bread crumbs, the "witch". Hansel and Gretel aren't the real names of the two Jewish children who are left in the woods during WWII by a desperate father and stepmother trying to flee the Nazis. Their real names must remain secret, so the young children will be hopefully be taken in and suspected to be Christian. The first person they come upon in the woods is Magda, a midwife who lives alone in the hut near a village. Magda is suspected to be a witch by the villagers and the children alike, but she agrees to take them in and feed them despite their fears. As the war nears its' end, we see how the Nazis stationed in the nearby village frantically try to keep control of the villagers and remain true to their goals of wiping out "undesirables". Madga suspects the children are Jews, but has vowed to keep them safe at all costs. The wonderful weaving of the main themes of Hansel and Gretel with a survival story during WWII makes for a simply amazing read. The one minor problem I had was that ending didn't wrap up everything as well as I would have liked. Otherwise, a unique work that I urge you to read.

SCARY... BUT IT WAS WORTH IT!!!:
"The German soldier suddenly sighed. It almost stopped the Mechanik. It was a human thing, this soft, sad exhalation of air. The sound of a tired and homesick man who might be a normal man sighing in his loneliness. The Mechanik was so close he could smell the soap that the German had bathed with; the smell of oil from stolen Polish sausages and a whiff of the vodka he drank with his lunch to keep of the damp and the cold." I cannot believe that I had this book for so long waiting to be read. The year is 1943 and Word War II is threatening. Meet Hansel and Gretel whose Jewish names are changed for their protection, as they are sent into the wintry forest by their parents to hide and get a head start, as the Germans begin to move in on their Polish turf. This is done in the childrens' best interests to avoid any confrontation or abuse, or even death at the hands of the Nazis officers, as World War II rears it's ugly head. I remained spell bounded as Hansel and Gretel, wandered cold and hungry through the forest in a somewhat oblivious and uncertainty state. They soon are able to breath a sigh of relief for a while as the come into a village and encounter kindness in the form of Madga, an old lady who is willing to guard them with her life as far as possible. There are tremendous shocks throughout this book as the Germans presence and pressure is felt and seen by all the villagers. In the meanwhile Hansel and Gretel's family are worried about their safety as day after day passes, and the days darken into despair, lunacy, turmoil and thoughts of survival is all that is in the hearts and minds of the Jewish people. This book was indeed a page-turner, and held my interest. Highly recommended!!! I give it five stars. Heather Marshall Negahdar (SUGAR-CANE) 07/06/06

Moving, lovely prose:
Despite some predictable plot turns, this book is beautifully written. The author is an accomplished poet & it shows in her prose. One particularly poignant passage brought me to tears (a very rare occurrance). This book has great depth, yet is very readable on any level. I highly recommend it.

An extraordinary retelling of an old familiar tale:
What a compelling read. In many ways, I found The True Story of Hansel and Gretel to be like encountering a train wreck. So many of the things that happened to the characters were horrific -- yet I couldn't look away. Louise Murphy gives us the Witch as a good woman with Romani heritage and gypsy knowledge -- shadowed by the evil context in which people have always tried to place those whose knowledge and ways are different, therefore, threatening. The innocence of the children -- and how it is peeled away like the rind of Gretel's imaginary oranges -- feels real. I found myself moved by the way in which so many of the characters attempted to protect each other by keeping things from them, then suffered the disasterous results when it became clear that those efforts hardly mattered. I was particularly struk by Telek, whose love for a woman enables him to overcome his dark past and become the hero he could never have been before. The way we see how easily violence could come to him contrasted with his amazing gentleness to those he loves is simply gorgeous. The monstrousness of the Nazi and his "Brown Sister" are both believable and grotesque. Through it all, the shadow of the original fairy tale alternately gives us foreshadowing and double meanings, right down to an ending that feels right without seeming too contrived. Highly recommended.