Book Review of
My Grandfather Would Have Shot Me
At age 38, Jennifer Teege happened to pluck a library book from the shelf—and discovered a horrifying fact: Her grandfather was Amon Goeth, the vicious Nazi commandant depicted in Schindler’s List. Reviled as the “butcher of Płaszów,” Goeth was executed in 1946. The more Teege learned about him, the more certain she became: If her grandfather had met her—a black woman—he would have killed her.
Teege’s discovery sends her into a severe depression—and fills her with questions: Why did her birth mother withhold this chilling secret? How could her grandmother have loved a mass murderer? Can evil be inherited?
Teege’s story is cowritten by Nikola Sellmair, who also adds historical context and insight from Teege’s family and friends, in an interwoven narrative. Ultimately, Teege’s search for the truth leads her, step by step, to the possibility of her own liberation.
Lynn's Review
A friend of mine let me borrow this book and I read it in two days. It was that good! I have read a lot of books on WWII, but My Grandfather Would Have Shot Me is a totally different perspective of WWII than I have ever read. It is about a modern day woman who finds out horrible things about her family’s Nazi past. I could not put this book down. The more I read her story the more fascinated with it I became. This will be one of my favorite books of 2016 and is one of the best WWII books that I have read. I love it not so much for the actual writing, but because the story is so amazing. If you love WWII books or really any type of non fiction history type books, I highly recommend this. War is not pretty and this contains some pretty graphic WWII war information, so I would recommend it for teens and adults not for children.