A Silence That Speaks: A Family Story Through and Beyond the Holocaust

Table of Contents:
Family Tree: The Descendants of Josef and Cacilie Smetana; Foreword By Stephen D. Smith Mbe; Preface; Chapter 1: A JOURNEY IN TIME: THE SEARCH BEGINS; Chapter 2: A BRIEF INTRODUCTION; My mother's immediate family; The Smetana Family; The Weinberger Family; Chapter 3: AUNTS, UNCLES AND COUSINS A WORLD AWAY; The Family of Otto Smetana; The Steininger Family; The Family of Karl Smetana; Chapter 4: JOSEF SMETANA'S ANCESTRY: AN INNKEEPER'S SON OR SON OF A COMPOSER? Was Josef Smetana related to the composer? The Smetany/Smetana Family of Ungarisch Brod; Reflections on ancestral bonds; Chapter 5: THE JEWISH COMMUNITIES OF BOHEMIA AND MORAVIA; Chapter 6: THE NAZI MACHINE IN AUSTRIA; Introduction; Nazi Germany and the Anschluss; The process of Aryanisation in Austria; The estate of Fritz Smetana; Forms and standard letters used during Aryanisation; Offices, departments and organisations dealing with Jewish matters; Officials involved; Other terms and phrases associated with the Nazi era; Extracts of Nazi correspondence; Chapter 7: THE LIFE AND FATE OF JOSEF AND CACILIE SMETANA; Building a new life: family and business; The fate of Josef and Cacilie under the Nazis; Fitting memorials; Chapter 8: THE TRAGIC LIFE OF FRITZ SMETANA; Promising beginnings; Commemoration in San Marino; A lonely end; Chapter 9: IN SEARCH OF BERTA SMETANA; The Weinbergers; Berta: who was she? Flight from Vienna; "Tante Berthe was a good woman"; Le Devoir de Memoire; Chapter 10: MY MOTHER'S LIFE IN VIENNA (1919-1938); Childhood in Hietzing; Growing up in central Vienna; Escape to England; Chapter 11: MY MOTHER'S LIFE IN ENGLAND: LIVES ENTWINED; Early days; An unusual family life; A return to roots; Chapter 12: A LIFE OF MY OWN? Chapter 13: END OF AN ERA; Post-Script: Butterflies and Other Coincidences; Appendices 1 to 14: Translation Of Documents; Appendix 15: A NOTE ON CZECH JEWISH GENEALOGY; Jewish Vital Records in Bohemia and Moravia; The Czech Memorial Scrolls; List Of Illustrations; Bibliography; Sources, Credits And Acknowledgements.

About the Author :
Susan Soyinka has worked as a teacher, lecturer, and researcher, spending 10 years of her early career in West Africa. On her return to England, she retrained as an educational psychologist, and after discovering her Jewish roots, worked for nine years in the Jewish community in London. Retirement has given her the time and energy to develop a new career as a writer. Her first book, From East End to Land's End, The Evacuation of Jews' Free School, London, to Mousehole in Cornwall during World War Two, was described by Aumie Shapiro, author of the Jewish East End photographic series, as an "extraordinary, significant story of inter-faith and community harmony. A magnificent achievement."

Review :
Stephen Smith, Executive Director of the Shoah Foundation Institute, writes in his Foreword: "In this remarkable book, Susan... was able to give names to the nameless, faces to the faceless - and restore the wholeness of a family the Nazis had intended to destroy.... It restores life where there was death, presence where there was absence, roots where identity was lost, hope where there was despair."