A Rebel in Auschwitz: The True Story of the Resistance Hero Who Fought the Nazis from Inside the Camp

Gr 7 Up–What’s immediately striking here is the casting of a woman to narrate: the titular rebel is the Polish hero—a man—Witold Pilecki. So, too, is the author Fairweather, who adapted his 2019 award-winning The Volunteer. The reasons for choosing a female voice never seem obvious, but Betsy Meiman confidently reads on, her performance consistently crisp and thoughtful. In a narrative about Auschwitz, the graphic horrors haunt, but Meiman remains in careful control, never devolving toward frenzied overdramatization. Three months after the Germans opened the infamous Polish death camp, Pilecki entered its hell in September 1940: “his mission, for the Polish resistance [was] to infiltrate the camp, create an underground resistance, and gather evidence of Nazi crimes.” Pilecki survived for almost three years inside, saving lives, enabling escapes. His deserved recognition happened only after his death.