Sofa Spotlight - The Tattooist of Auschwitz, Heather Morris

It was difficult to not compare this to other books about the Holocaust that I’ve read, well actually it was impossible, so there will be a little bit of comparison going on with this. I read it over the course of three or four day and overall I thought the book was good, and an important one to be written.




So other books that I was subconsciously comparing this to were, The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, Schindler’s Ark, The Book Thief (not concentration camp themed but relevant) and parts of The Hiding Place where Corrie ten Boom talks about her experiences in Ravensbruck camp. But this is also a book in its own right and should be treated as such.

The story is about two Jews, Lale and Gita who meet while they are imprisoned at Auschwitz. The story follows their romance as Lale, the man who tattoos the prisoner numbers on new prisoners arriving at the camp, while trying to help as many of his fellow prisoners keep going and survive.




What I found refreshing was the way in which Lale’s perception is portrayed. I think that I forget how at the start people didn’t necessarily know that the camps existed or when they were taken away where they were being taken to and what their fate would be. Lale initially has a little optimism about what might happen, and through the book it is his optimism that gets not only himself but others through the experience.




Also different was that Lale has a very different experience to the average prisoner at Auschwitz. As the tattooist he has his own room and extra rations. His worry is that he will be seen as a collaborator and it’s interesting to see what it was like for people who did what they had to do to survive, even if what they did was questionable and distasteful to them.

Although well written it didn’t have the same impact on me as Schindler’s Ark. Nor did it make me cry like the Book Thief did. I’m still trying to work out why this is. The characters were well formed and I felt like I knew them but I didn’t feel Lale’s grief as much as was maybe intended.




However, the story intrigued me so much that when it was over I was reading all the postscripts and author’s notes at the end. When you read something like this you want to know how realistic it is. Morris provides the answers, not to every question I had, but enough to satisfy my curiosity. Morris tell us that Lale’s story is mostly true, with artistic license for the story. Hearing her comments on how she heard the story really brought home how hard and life changing these events were for all who experienced them.

Would I recommend it? Yes, because it is very readable and it’s so important that we don’t forget what happened. These events must never happen again.