The sheer amount of abuse, atrocity, and indifference in this book is staggering. The sheer amount of perseverance, heart, and resilience in this book is staggering. And to know that this book is based on a true story and a part of history. Don't neglect to read the notes by the author at the end of the book. They are integral in realizing how the book came about and the historical research that was the foundation for this story.

As other reviews have mentioned, the main character in this book was in the author's first book, The Tattooist of Auschwitz. While I have not had the opportunity to read the first book, it didn't hinder my understanding of reading this title. I'm sure it would definitely be beneficial and add more to the story to read The Tattooist of Auschwitz first. Cilka's Journey includes flashbacks to the previous story that played out in The Tattooist of Auschwitz, but the main focus is centered on Cilka's time in a Siberian prison camp. This story leaves you asking yourself a lot of hard questions. What would I have done in those situations? It's easy to speculate what noble, fair decisions you would have made when you've never been put in such heartrending, unfair circumstances.

This story leaves you emotionally drained reading about all of the depraved acts that humanity can bring about in the world. It also leaves you hopeful that even in such depths a light can shine to cut through the darkness. Regardless of all the incessant abuse and horrific situations that are thrown at Cilka, she persists. Even when she thinks she has no more left to give, that she will always be cursed to walk with death around her, she finds a way to keep taking a step forward. I rated this five stars. I normally rate a book five stars if I would be willing to read it again. I don't know that I will read this title again, but I don't think you would have to read this title again to refresh your memory. The author does a more than adequate job of leaving this story seared into your memory long after you've finished the last chapter. I will definitely be recommending this title for the library collection.

This is a heavy read. It is not a happy story. The storyline covers a young Jewish woman’s time in a concentration camp during WWII and her imprisonment post war, in a gulag by the Soviets, Amidst brutality both received and observed by the protagonist Cilka, one wonders how she manages to sustain any semblance of humanity. The author does not skirt the violence and evil of the story, but I do not feel there is any gratuitousness. Underneath the veneer of toughness Cilka projects and the compromises she makes to keep herself alive is a woman capable of compassion and sacrifice. The fact that Cilka manages in the end to find love and happiness, and apparently some measure of emotional health based on interviews by the author, of people who knew her post war/gulag is astounding. The post story pages are fascinating and I wish I had actually read them first.

I continually return to WWII books. I'm drawn to the epic ordinariness of the people who responded to their horrific circumstances with extraordinary bravery and ingenuity. It serves as a reminder to me what can happen to any people that are not vigilant in preserving their human rights and that of others. I especially love novels that are based on actual events or people. Cilka's Journey is one such a book. But there is such a moral twist to this story that sets the heart to breaking. What would you be willing to do to survive while watching all those you love die?
Cilka is pulled from her idyllic youthful life and lands in Auschwitz/Birkenau at 16 years old where she finds herself traded between two of the Commandants of the camp and thus spared the death sentence reserved for Jews. The pain of that life follows her upon her liberation from the concentration camp only to find herself a prisoner, sentenced to 15 years hard labor in a Siberian Gulag.
What follows is Cilka's life in the prison camp and her desperate need to make up for surviving the concentrations camps. Trading one hell for another, Cilka tries her best to suppress her past in her own mind and fearful it will be exposed to her new fellow prisoners.
I originally thought the ending was quite abrupt but realized everything that happened to Cilka since turning 16 years old was of an abrupt nature and one she had no control over. Ultimately, it was a perfect ending. This books is for anyone that loves to see triumph over tragedy.

From the author of The Tattooist of Auschwitz comes another poignant read.
When I received an email that Heather Morris was releasing another book and it was available on NetGalley, I jumped at the chance to review it. I had read The Tattooist of Auschwitz and it hit me like a ton of bricks, so I knew if she was writing another, I HAD to get it.
Cilka's Journey follows Cilka Klein to the Vorkuta Gulag after the liberation of Auschwitz. Sentenced to fifteen years of hard labor for her actions while imprisoned in Auschwitz, Cilka is put on another cattle train and shipped to Siberia to repent and assist Mother Russia. Three years in Auschwitz-Birkenau didn't break Cilka, and she vows that neither will this. Though she refuses to believe that she will fall in love and have a family, she firmly repeats to herself that she will get through this. Despite the humiliation of yet another place that has stripped her of her identity and assigned her an identification number, despite still wearing the identity of a prisoner of Auschwitz (which she refers to only as "the other place"), Cilka will not be broken. She understands how these camps works, knows there is a hierarchy, and in giving her body to Boris, the man who has chosen her, she has been granted a reprieve from gang rape and harassment from the the other male prisoners.
When she is offered a position as a trainee nurse, Cilka realises that this job will not only help her, but also her hutmates, as it offers an increase in food, which she can smuggle back to keep them, and their Brigadier Antonina Karpovna better fed, and therefore less likely to toss their hut looking for contraband. Boris' protection doesn't extend to Hannah, one of her hutmates, who has found out about why Cilka was sentenced to Vorkuta. Taking full advantage of Cilka's position as a nurse, Hannah extorts her for pills in exchange for her silence about Cilka's previous life.
As the weeks turn into years, Cilka's life of imprisonment continues on. Using her friendly relationship with doctor Yelena Georgiyevna, CIlka is able to secure indoor jobs for several of her hutmates, including young Jozefina. Cilka and Josie have had a tumultuous friendship, but Cilka hopes that she will be able to keep a better eye on Josie working in the same area.
When a Commandant's daughter is brought in with a broken arm, Cilka makes an impression on the girl's mother and father with her gentle manner of tending to the child. Several years later, Cilka has become an ambulatory nurse and is called to a Commandant's home to transport a child to the hospital for medical attention. On arrival, the child is Katya, the same one to whose arm she previously tended. After an appendectomy, Katya's mother approaches Cilka to thank her and offer her a favor. Not for the first time, Cilka refuses assistance for herself, instead trading her freedom for a friend's.
Told with interspersed flashbacks of her time in Auschwitz-Birkenau, Cilka's story is one of heartbreak, and loss, and a spirit so unbreakable in a time when there seemed to be no hope. Cilka Klein is a woman who helped many, but whose name is not well known. Cilka didn't deserve the life she was given, but she found a way to make the most of it. Convinced she was an angel of death and that everyone who got close to her died, she turned to nursing in a wide capacity to try to make a difference. She worked in surgery, maternity, infectious disease (typhoid ran rampant through Vorkuta for several months - and her own sister died of it in Auschwitz-Birkenau), and riding in the ambulance to transport injuries prisoners to the hospital.
Morris has done yet another fantastic job in telling the unknown story of a Jewish prisoner during, and after, Hitler's reign of terror. The history we are taught overlooks these people, the ones who did what they had to in order to survive, to keep death at bay for just one more day. Stories like Cilka's, and Lale's, and Gita's, are not unique. They are the stories of the fighters, the ones who refused to let the German's, or the Russians break them. Stories like Cilka's need to be told, and Heather Morris does her due diligence in her research in order to do just that.
The biggest of thank you's to Heather Morris for telling the forgotten stories.

I am in awe! Cilka’s Journey by Heather Morris is a beautiful book.

If you read the Tattooist of Auschwitz, you will love Cilka’s Journey. We met Cilka in the Tattooist of Auschwitz and as you can guess this is her story. I fell in love with Cilka as she is such a warm, kind person. Reading what she went through will break your heart.

I am not going to tell you anything about the book because I want you to discover her and her journey on your own. This book was a little easier to experience than the Tattooist of Auschwitz. I am not sure if it was because I thought I knew the horrors that would be coming or if this was truly a more gentle story just as Cilka is.

Please don’t miss reading Cilka’s Journey!

I actually loved this book more than the first one. The story follows Cilka after WWII ends when she is convicted of sleeping with the enemy (the Nazis) and sent to a prison in Siberia. What follows is a fasincating tale of human survival and friendship again. After coming out of the concentration camps and into a prison, her resolve to continue to exist and be successful in the prison is amazing. The writing is great, the story is interesting. I actually finished it in basically one sitting. Loved this book!

This was a beautiful and inspiring story, based on fact. Cilka, at the young age of 16, in 1942, was sent to a concentration camp. She was beautiful and noticed by the higher authority. She survived by doing whatever she had to do because it also gave her a chance to help the other women in the camp. After the end of the war, she was not freed as she was accused of being a collaborator with the enemy and was sent to serve 15 years hard labor. Cilka proved to be selfless, always looking to serve others who were suffering. She gave up many chances to be better off in order to make things better for someone else.
I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Cilka‘s Journey by Heather Morris is Historical Fiction based on fact. When I first started reading this book I thought when does this woman’s torture end. Will I be able to finish reading this book? My next thought was if she could endure the daily persecution by Nazi Socialists and by Soviet Socialists surely I can read about her life. What kind of people treat others in this manner and how are they given the power to do such atrocities? Gulag residents had lives of nightmares, constant fear, horror, degradation, deprivation and depravity. It is a heartbreaking story but then the story changes. A pervasive evil surrounds her but Cilka endures and more. A woman who thinks she cannot love, seems to love everyone even her enemies. It becomes a story of hope because of one person who touched and changed so many lives. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in history because of the factual details in the story, notes and the afterword. For everyone else the portrayal of a life well lived.
I received a complimentary copy of this book from Netgalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. I appreciate the opportunity and thank the author and publisher for allowing me to read, enjoy and review this book.

More historical than fiction according to the author this book is a must read. I read it as much as I could without wanting to out it down. The courage and strength of Cilka is unbelievable. To share how she survived would spoil the book. I fortunately my copy of The first book was loaned to someone and not returned yet so it will not be read until later. Heather Morris states in her notes, Lale, the Tattooist, gave her so much of the information and resources that there is more fact in this book than fiction. It is considered The Tattooist of Auschwitz #2.
I recommend this highly.

I enjoyed this book. I didn't read Heather's previous book, and I will go read that book next as I want to know Cilka's life before Siberia. I didn't really know about the prisoners being sent there from the concentration camps so that was a piece of history that I would like to explore more. The character of Cilka although based upon a true person made me question how someone going through so much pain could willingly pass on opportunities to better her personal life situation for eg, not moving to the nurse's quarters earlier than she did.

The one problem I had is there were some relationships that ended without explanation. The man who visited her - did he ever look for her? Did she ever see any of the other prisoners once they were released? And although I hope it happened, the ending seemed as if it was tied up with a ribbon too quickly. I guess my issue is that I want to know more about her life.

I would recommend this book. It held my attention, and I couldn't wait to get back to it to see what happened next.

Cilka’s Journey by Heather Morris
Is a very heartbreaking novel of how some of the prisoners were treated by the Russians after the war was over. They didn’t have a choice, but to do as the Nazi leaders wanted them to do.
Cilka was sentenced to 15 years at a work camp in Siberian prison.
Cilka was made a prostitute at the age of 16 and her life continued as one in the work camp. She is a very kind person who puts her friend’s needs ahead of hers. Her journey is one that is so unbelievable and how she survived I do not know.
Thanks to St. Martin’s Press, Heather Morris and Net Galley for this ARC for my honest review.

I loved [book:The Tattooist of Auschwitz|38359036]. After I read the book I read that there were questions concerning the veracity of this book. I did not read this as a work of nonfiction, but rather a work of fiction based on real events. I certainly get that there may inaccuracies, but the spirit of the novel worked for me. A message that must be conveyed - the importance of never forgetting the horrific things that happened. Things that we have to be reminded of because there are so few Holocaust survivors left, because of the rise of antisemitism in the world, and because there is a lack of awareness of the Holocaust among young people. There are, I’m certain, many nonfiction books and documents covering the Holocaust and the Siberian Gulags , but I’ve never been a big reader of nonfiction. For me, and this is just my personal experience, it has been mostly Holocaust fiction that has has opened my eyes to the atrocities and has broken my heart with immensity of the loss of so many people. If a work of fiction can do that, in my opinion it is worth reading. It is with this view that I read [book:Cilka's Journey|45033931] and that I high recommend it. I appreciate that Heather Morris tells the reader upfront that the book is a work of fiction. In a note at the end, she explains what is fact and what is fiction. With my defense of this book as fiction, I should add that there are memoirs that I hold in my heart and believe that everyone should read. [book:Night|1617], [book:The Diary of Anne Frank: And Related Readings|5515], [book:But You Did Not Come Back|25779058] to name a few.

It’s unimaginable that a young girl could survive the horrific Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp for three years after being subjected to sexual abuse, forced to do unthinkable things in order to stay alive and then be sentenced to fifteen years in a Gulag in Siberia for aiding the enemy. Heather Morris enables us to imagine these horrors and takes us to both of these places in this novel. Moving back and forth between Cilka’s flashbacks of Auschwitz-Birkenau and her present Siberia, we are seamlessly taken from place to place, from time to time. Sometimes it’s a thought, a dream , or a present ugly reminder that takes Cilka and us back and forth . It is difficult and uncomfortable and necessary for us to see and imagine how horrible it was. I’m not going to detail any of that here, but will just say that this is an important work of fiction which reflects the horrors of these times and places, but also the real emotions, the real humanity, the real love and the real resilience of people that historical fiction can convey.

I received an advanced copy of this book from St. Martin’s Press through NetGalley and copy from Jordan Hanley at St. Martin’s.

This is an incredibly powerful book and it reminded me once again why I loved reading historical fiction. The story is so raw and full of emotion that captivates and urges readers to consider the consequences of historical actions. It's especially moving nowadays as our society is slowly becoming a mirror reflection of the past and rooted in bigotry and hatred which just makes this story even more important.

This was a haunting and heartbreakingly beautiful novel of the resilience of the human spirit after the atrocities of war . It is so good and such a wonderful follow up to her first novel. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for letting me review this book

So excited to get an advance reading of Cilkas Journey. After reading The Tattooist of Aushwitz I was fascinated to read “the rest of the story” for Cilka. Heather Morris does a fabulous job of including fact with fiction and keeping us turning the next page. The sections added at the end of the book were very informative as well to add more facts to her story.

A poignant, heartbreaking and yet life-affirming novel, one which will haunt the reader long after the final page. Heather Morris once again delivers a novel of harrowing suspense and humanism, fierce and moving.

Thank you - first and foremost author Heather Morris.
Thank you Netgalley and St. Martins Publishing- and their terrific staff who are some of the most hardworking generous people in the book world!
What follows is my honest review of this book. I highly recommend this book. Heather Morris outdid herself on this one. Well told, horrific story. You need to read this one!

After surviving Auschwitz, Cilka was sentenced to 16 years in a gulag prison in Siberia for "corroborating" with the Nazis. She entered Auschwitz at the young age of 16 and learned early what she had to do to stay alive: she must do as ordered, and became a "camp wife" of a German commander. Even though she helped sick and dying women in the camp, after the war ended she was deemed as a camp "prostitute." The story follows Cilka through years of brutal and deadly conditions, while showing the resilience and compassion she bestowed to others. Quite an emotional roller-coaster ride of a novel, I could not put it down. Based on a true story, it is well-researched and author, Heather Morris, gives additional information in her afterword that lends so much to the basis of her novel. Thanks to NetGalley for letting me read an early advance copy of "Cilka's Journey." I hope my review will inspire others to read this engrossing tale.

Cilka's Journey by Heather Morris
Cilka's Journey (The Tattooist of Auschwitz, #2)
by Heather Morris (Goodreads Author)

Beth Olion's review
Aug 30, 2019 · edit

Thank you NetGalley for the chance to read and review this book before publication. I was excited to see a book about Cilka after ready The Tattooist of Auschwitz and Cilka’s Journey did not disappoint. By intermingling Cilka’s struggles in the Gulag with her memories of Auschwitz, Heather Morris weaves a fascinating tale of true survival. The author uses a nice mix of historical events with fiction. I especially liked the notes and additional information at the end of the book. I would definitely recommend this book. Thank you again NetGalley for the chance to read this early!

I could not put this book down! I was so caught up in Cilka's story and couldn't wait to find out if she had a happy ending.

Her story is a story of resilience, perseverance, and hope. Life is unfair and was doubly unfair to Cilka. After being freed from Auschwitz by the Russians she is sentenced to 15 years in the Vorkuta Gulag in Siberia. Her "crime" was that of being a Nazi collaborator when actually her only "crime" was staying alive.

Once arriving at the Gulag, Cilka and the other women struggle to find their place. Initially, they do not trust each other, however over the course of time and hardship they become a family. I especially love the relationship between Cilka and Josie. Josie is a young girl, naive in the ways of the world. Cilka, who is not much older than Josie in age but has had to grow up fast. Cilka takes Josie under her wing and helps her to adjust to the hardships in the Gulag. Cilka is the kindest, most selfless person, who very rarely asks anything for herself.

Cilka finds a job as a nurse in the Gulag hospital where she meets a doctor named Yelena, who shows Cilka the compassion she deserves. Through Yelena's compassion, Cilka begins to flourish and gain hope that she, too, can have a good life.

This is the second book in The Tattooist of Auschwitz series. Even though it is second in the series, the book can easily stand alone. Ms. Morris provides more background information about what happened to Cilka through flashbacks from 1939-1945 interspersed throughout the story.

Ms. Morris does an excellent job with character development and I feel like I know them and care for them. I would highly recommend this book for anyone who is a fan of "The Tattooist of Auschwitz", WWII fiction, and historical fiction.

Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.