Listen and read

Step into an infinite world of stories

  • Listen and read as much as you want
  • Over 400 000+ titles
  • Bestsellers in 10+ Indian languages
  • Exclusive titles + Storytel Originals
  • Easy to cancel anytime
Subscribe now
Details page - Device banner - 894x1036

How to Be a Refugee: The gripping true story of how one family hid their Jewish origins to survive the Nazis

3 Ratings

5

Duration
9H 54min
Language
English
Format
Category

Biographies

'A lyrical, fascinating, important book. More than just a family story, it is an essay on belonging, denying, pretending, self-deception and, at least for the main characters, survival.' Literary Review

'Simon May's remarkable How to Be a Refugee is a memoir of family secrets with a ruminative twist, one that's more interested in what we keep from ourselves than the ones we conceal from others.' Irish Times

The most familiar fate of Jews living in Hitler’s Germany is either emigration or deportation to concentration camps. But there was another, much rarer, side to Jewish life at that time: denial of your origin to the point where you manage to erase almost all consciousness of it. You refuse to believe that you are Jewish.

How to Be a Refugee is Simon May’s gripping account of how three sisters – his mother and his two aunts – grappled with what they felt to be a lethal heritage. Their very different trajectories included conversion to Catholicism, marriage into the German aristocracy, securing ‘Aryan’ status with high-ranking help from inside Hitler’s regime, and engagement to a card-carrying Nazi.

Even after his mother fled to London from Nazi Germany and Hitler had been defeated, her instinct for self-concealment didn’t abate. Following the early death of his father, also a German Jewish refugee, May was raised a Catholic and forbidden to identify as Jewish or German or British.

In the face of these banned inheritances, May embarks on a quest to uncover the lives of the three sisters as well as the secrets of a grandfather he never knew. His haunting story forcefully illuminates questions of belonging and home – questions that continue to press in on us today.

© 2021 Picador (Audiobook): 9781529042832

Release date

Audiobook: 21 January 2021

Others also enjoyed ...

  1. Lily's Promise: How I Survived Auschwitz and Found the Strength to Live Lily Ebert
  2. The Happiest Man on Earth: The Beautiful Life of an Auschwitz Survivor Eddie Jaku
  3. The Dressmakers of Auschwitz: The True Story of the Women Who Sewed to Survive Lucy Adlington
  4. The Sisters of Auschwitz: The True Story of Two Jewish Sisters’ Resistance in the Heart of Nazi Territory Roxane van Iperen
  5. The Last Jews in Berlin Leonard Gross
  6. The Little Girl Who Could Not Cry Lidia Maksymowicz
  7. Hitler's Children: Sons and Daughters of Third Reich Leaders Gerald Posner
  8. The Nazis Knew My Name: A remarkable story of survival and courage in Auschwitz Maya Lee
  9. My Name Is Selma: The Remarkable Memoir of a Jewish Resistance Fighter and Ravensbrück Survivor Selma van de Perre
  10. Auschwitz and The Allies: A Devastating Account of How the Allies Responded to the News of Hitler's Mass Murder Martin Gilbert
  11. The Secret Holocaust Diaries Nonna Bannister
  12. Devil's Diary: Alfred Rosenberg and the Stolen Secrets of the Third Reich David Kinney
  13. The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million Daniel Mendelsohn
  14. The Volunteer: One Man, an Underground Army, and the Secret Mission to Destroy Auschwitz Jack Fairweather
  15. Auschwitz Lullaby: A Novel Mario Escobar
  16. The Boy Who Drew Auschwitz: A Powerful True Story of Hope and Survival Thomas Geve
  17. Nazi Terror: The Gestapo, Jews, and Ordinary Germans Eric A. Johnson
  18. A Girl Called Renee Ruth Uzrad
  19. Mengele: Unmasking the "Angel of Death" David G. Marwell
  20. Why?: Explaining the Holocaust Peter Hayes
  21. Neighbors: The Destruction of the Jewish Community in Jedwabne, Poland Jan T. Gross
  22. The Auschwitz Protocols: Ceslav Mordowicz and the Race to Save Hungary's Jews Fred R. Bleakley
  23. Witness to the Storm: A Jewish Journey from Nazi Berlin to the 82nd Airborne, 1920–1945 Werner T. Angress
  24. This is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor Adam Kay
  25. All The Light We Cannot See Anthony Doerr
  26. The Nazis Knew My Name Maya Lee
  27. Remembering Ravensbrück: Holocaust to Healing Natalie Hess
  28. The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany William L. Shirer
  29. We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families: Stories From Rwanda: Picador Classic Philip Gourevitch
  30. Hiding in Plain Sight: My Holocaust Story of Survival Beatrice Sonders
  31. Holocaust Memoirs of a Bergen-Belsen Survivor: Classmate of Anne Frank Nanette Blitz Konig
  32. Beyond the Last Path: A Buchenwald Survivor's Story Eugene Weinstock
  33. Code Name: Lise: The True Story of the Woman Who Became WWII's Most Highly Decorated Spy Larry Loftis
  34. The Kommandant's Girl Pam Jenoff
  35. A Mother's Courage: How I survived the Holocaust - a remarkable story of bravery, kindness and hope Malka Levine
  36. The Brothers of Auschwitz Malka Adler
  37. Crying in H Mart: The Number One New York Times Bestseller Michelle Zauner
  38. Hell before Their Very Eyes: American Soldiers Liberate Concentration Camps in Germany, April 1945 John C. McManus
  39. War Doctor: Surgery on the Front Line David Nott
  40. The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family and Defiance During the Blitz Erik Larson
  41. The Boy Who Drew Auschwitz: A Powerful True Story of Hope and Survival Thomas Geve
  42. The Light of Days: The Untold Story of Women Resistance Fighters in Hitler's Ghettos Judy Batalion
  43. In Another Time: A Novel Jillian Cantor