Reviews for The Box from Braunau: In Search of My Father's War
The Box from Braunau: In Search of My Father's War was chosen as Book of the Month for May 2009 by the publisher (Amacom). For more information about the book from Amacom, go to www.amacombooks.org/book.cfm?isbn=9780814410493Library Journal
http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6660949.html?industryid=47110 "Elvin offers an honest and unsentimental account that should benefit soldiers past and present now experiencing PTSD, as well as their families and all readers interested in the consequences of PTSD."
Mark's Bookshelf
http://www.midwestbookreview.com/rbw/jul_09.htm#mark
"Who says that wars are only fought in real time and in just one location? Jan Elvin breaks that misnomer with a dramatic new book investigating her father's military involvement in World War II, and its impact on himself and his family."
Lois's Bookshelf
http://www.midwestbookreview.com/rbw/jul_09.htm#lois
"Well-illustrated with black and white photographs, and supplemented by a comprehensive index, bibliography and glossary, this part history part memoir is of importance to scholar and general reader alike."
Bookpleasures -- Emily Decobert Review
http://www.bookpleasures.com/websitepublisher/articles/723/1/The-Box-from-Braunau-In-Search-of-My-Fathers-War-Reviewed-by-Emily-Decobert-of-Bookpleasurescom/Page1.html
Bookpleasures -- Lavanya Karthik Review
http://www.bookpleasures.com/websitepublisher/articles/758/1/The-Box-from-Braunau-In-Search-of-My-Fathers-War-Reviewed-by-Lavanya-Karthik-Of-Bookpleasurescom/Page1.html
"This is father-daughter memoir at its most poignant."
The Sacramento Bee
Robert Rosenheck, M.D.
Professor of Psychiatry, Epidemiology and Public Health
Yale Medical School
Director, Division of Mental Health
Northeast Program Evaluation Center, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
"Jan Elvin has written a riveting story of a daughter's quest to find her soldier father, decades after the smoke cleared from both his last World War II battle and the death camp high in the hills of Austria . It is the unique tale of an exceptional man, his extraordinary daughter and the journey that brings them ever closer together, even after his death. But it is also the story of every soldier and every soldier's daughter, a journey on which Elvin artfully invites other Americans to embark. "
Ben H. Bagdikian, author of The Media Monopoly, Dean Emeritus, University of California at Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism
"In a box marked only "Braunau 1944," Jan Elvin uncovered the link to the World War II experiences that her father had refused to share. From the landing on Omaha Beach to the liberation of the concentration camp at Ebensee , Austria , the diaries and letters of Army Lt. Bill Elvin reveal the final Allied offensive against Germany as it really was. This daughter's discovery of her father's hidden past is a beautifully written and carefully researched narrative that is hard to put down. "
Robert H. Abzug, author of Inside the Vicious Heart: Americans and the Liberation of Nazi Concentration Camps Professor of History and Director, Schusterman Center for Jewish Studies, University of Texas at Austin
"Jan Elvin's journey of discovery, in both its personal and historical dimensions, powerfully communicates the ongoing impact of war from generation to generation. At the center are the reverberations of her father's encounter as a G.I. with Ebensee, one of the cruelest of Hitler's labor camps. That experience and the war in general distanced him from daughter and family in unspoken ways but eventually prepared the ground for at least partial reconciliation and mutual understanding."
