Sam Kates

A very short and poignant story about a Holocaust survivor, Samuel, who has been searching for over thirty years for Helena, the daughter of Joseph, his friend and fellow inmate at Birkenau. After the Soviet liberation of the camp, Samuel placed advertisements in newspapers, hired detectives, and searched registers and parish records to find Helena, to unburden himself of guilt and the debt he owes her father. Samuel's daughter, Rachel, eventually locates Helena, introduces the two, and show more translates her father's story

Samuel and Joseph managed to survive in Birkenau until the last weeks of the WWII. The Soviets were only a few weeks or days away from closing in on the Nazi concentration camp. This was not a time for prisoners’ dreams of rescue, but rather witness to the accelerated Nazi horror of mass murder before fleeing the approaching Soviet troops. The execution squads, gas chambers, and crematoriums could not work fast enough; the corpse cellars were full and Mengele’s “medical center” had no more room for “patients”.

Samuel and Joseph devise a plan by which one of them might be saved in order to search for the other’s family after the war. The numbers in the title refer to the numbers tattooed on the prisoners’ arms or pinned to their clothing. It is a clever, courageous plan, where one of the men will be sacrificed to save the other.

This story is so believable that it feels as though it might actually have occurred, and it is heart-wrenching.

Dying by Numbers is a freely available download from Kindle (does not count against KU loans). show less

The Cleansing revolves around a group of 5000 or so individuals around the world who have been tasked with the assignment of spreading a virus across the earth that will wipe out all but about 1% of humanity. We don't know who, or what these individuals are, nor do we know why they are wiping out humanity. This information is deliberately kept from us by the author. Herein lies much of the suspense of the story. The reader is constantly kept wondering about these people. I felt pretty sure I show more know their nature, but was constantly on guard to have a twist thrown at me by the author. As the story progresses, we see things from the perspective of those affected by the virus, as well as from the point of view of those disseminating it.

It was the wondering about the true nature of these 5000 people, and their plan, that kept me glued to this story initially, but this was also the story's undoing because it simply dragged on too long. I've found that I don't enjoy it when books don't wrap up their story. Even when it's part of a series (The Cleansing is part one of a two-part story), I expect a conclusion to one series of events, and the next book to begin a new set of events. This is absolutely a "To be continued...." type of novel. My interest faded before the grand plan for the virus was revealed and we found out who these people really are. The characters didn't feel particularly well fleshed out, but the world history created by the author was imaginative and interesting. I was overall a little disappointed, but curiosity may lead me to read part 2. show less

When I started reading this I wasn't sure what to make of it. The stories go from place to place but as I read through I found a common thread of great writing here. Mr Kates tells tales in his own unique way that can make your laugh or scratch your head. An enjoyable read for sure.

It's really hard to review this book. I can't tell much of the storyline because the least thing could be a spoiler. I hate dang spoilers.
I can tell you that the story for me was a fresh storyline on the whole "end of the world" theme. The thing I think I can tell you is that at the beginning of the book you will wonder about Milandra being able to "push" her messages across. The author does wind this up and explain why. He almost lost me in the explanation. I was like DaFuq? I did keep show more reading and came back into the story and ended up having a good read.
More like 3.5 stars.


Thank you Netgalley for the ARC show less