Didn't capture my attention and engagement. I'll hopefully try again in the future.
Didn't capture my attention and engagement. I'll hopefully try again in the future.
Didn't capture my attention and engagement. I'll hopefully try again in the future.

I was not able to review this book before it was archived. The star rating Below is meaningless. I will try to find it at the library

I've read many historical fiction books about WWII and the deportation of Jews to concentration camps by the Nazis. This one is special in that it is the chronical of one man and his family, and their actual experiences. I especially appreciated the afterword by his descendant..

This is one of those books that is vital--vital to remember, to make us all witnesses to the horrors that took place. These firsthand accounts of the way Jews were herded and deported and, for many, ultimately murdered, are raw and real. They touch at you the way a dramatized story never can. This collection is both moving and revealing. It should be required reading for the human race.

This title is a deeply personal memoir of the Holocaust that moves back and forth through time, making it difficult to follow the narrative at times.

This is not the normal type of book I read, but the description intrigued me. I knew nothing about the Nazi occupation of Greek Salonica before reading this. This is an account of the devastation of the occupation and near destruction of this community by the Nazis. The book is a bit more academic than I expected, but if you have an interest in history of that period and of that geographic region, I would recommend it.

This was a very moving and compelling look into a lesser known tragedy of World War II. Those interested in historical memoirs will want to read this.

I was drawn to this memoir to learn about the Holocaust in Greece, and really wanted to learn from it and relate to the people. Unfortunately, between the voices of Isaac, his son Robert, and Isaac's daughter in law, the story did not flow. At first I thought it was because it was just a weak translation, but I feel it is the disorganized presentation with " too many cooks in the kitchen".

Talking Until Nightfall is the first-hand reporting by Dr. Isaac Matarasso of the WWII treatment of the Jews who were from Salonica, Greece. He documented the stories of Jews returning from concentration camps. He documented what happened to their possessions and how they initially tried to begin their lives again. He numbered the survivors by age, gender, occupation, martial status. He numbered the murdered. He named the guilty. He wrote because he was compelled to bear witness.

His original account was written in 1946. His daughter-in-law translated this edition into English and wrote a lengthy, poetic introduction. The introduction is rather long, but don't skip it. It paints a picture of the humanity of Dr. Matarasso, and fleshes out his personal experiences of that time and beyond.

The chapters following the main section are more disjointed. There are several literary sketches of the time written by Dr. Matarasso, followed by the journal entries of George Matarasso, Dr. Matarasso's son. The narrative explanations between the chapters of George's account are not as helpful and even sound critical of him at times.

The final section is written by George Matarasso's son, Francois. His account shows the generational impact of the Holocaust.

‘Never again’ was not true then. It is not true now . The victims and the perpetrators change: the crimes do not."

I was provided an ARC if this book through #NetGalley

Thank you Netgally for an advance copy of this book.

I read a lot of WWII and Holocaust fiction. I wanted to like this more, but it didn't hit the mark for me as fiction. I might try it again during calmer times to see if I can connect.

I really looked forward to reading what I expected to be a gripping true account of Nazi brutality in Greece during WWII, but unfortunately I got stopped by the dry academic section written by the author’s daughter-in-law. The introduction was also dry but it did lay out the whys and wherefore of how the book came to be written and I assumed it would provide a good foundation for the story itself. Unfortunately, the next part was convoluted with so many names I very soon began to lose interest in. So here is my confession, I never made it to the heart of the book. I’m sure it will provide a great resource for researchers looking for information written in English, but I was not motivated to read any farther.

Told from the perspective of father, son and grandson this is the story of the German occupation of Salonica Greece. The father was a doctor and his eyewitness accounts of the atrocities and the efforts of the resistance are sobering and sad. His story is taken over by his son who recounts the numerous nightmares he had as only 2,000 of the 50,000 Jews taken to camp survived. Ending with the afterword by Isaac Matarosso’s grandson, Francois looks back at survivor’s stories and his family’s place in history.

It took a little time to get accustomed to the different authors, points of view, but actually found that interesting. Also interested to read about a part of WWII and Holocaust history I had not heard of .This book will be appreciated by those who like eye witness history

Talking Until Nightfall is a memoir of a generation of personal family members' insights of the horrendous events that lead up to and follows after the Holocast. This memoir helps you step in and gain a better understanding of a time in history that in our present day is fading away becoming elusive.

'Whoever listens to a witness, becomes a witness' (Elie Wiesel, famous Holocaust survivor).
'[A]nti-Semitism is not endemic, like skin colour. Antisemites are formed, not bred.'
These two quotes define why this book was written. It serves as a witness to the Holocaust and reminds readers today to never forget.
A tribute to the living and the dead, "Talking Until Nightfall" is a compilation of manuscripts and diary entries written by three generations - Isaac, Robert, and Francois Matarasso. The book reveals the realities of the Nazi occupation of Greece (April 1941 to October 1944) and its effect on Jews living in Salonica (Thessaloniki). Jewish doctor Isaac Matarasso and his young teen son Robert escaped imprisonment and torture and joined the resistance. After the city's liberation, they returned to rebuild Salonica and, along with the other survivors, to grapple with the near-total destruction of their community. Almost 50,000 Salonica Jews were sent to Nazi concentration camps during the war but only 2,000 returned.
This slim, wrenching account of loss, survival, and the strength of the human spirit ensures the Jews of Salonica are never forgotten. Anticipating deportation, Isaac reveals how he and fellow Jew Mordoh Pitchon 'continued talking until nightfall about our dead who enjoy eternal peace, and about the living victims soon to be gathered together in the ghetto. Our two souls were as one.'
I certainly was moved as I read it. I had also not realized Greece was occupied, and that fact motivated me to finish the book. I would share it, too, with friends who are interested in the Holocaust's impact on individuals and WW2 in Greece.
I only gave this book 3 stars because it's confusing to read at times. Francois explains the book's outline at the beginning, but I was still uncertain in parts about who was speaking. Also, some of the dates are also missing in my copy. Otherwise, this book would earn a solid 4 stars.

The opening explanation about the text is extensive and exhausting to muddle through. The remaining narratives are somewhat choppy but the stories are an important addition to the history of WWII and the persecution of people. The translation is okay but, whether it's due to the original text or the translator is unknown to me, the lack of punctuation makes it difficult to read.

Thank you to netgalley and the publisher for providing a copy of this book to read and review. The opinions expressed here are my own.

I appreciate the effort and the opportunity to read about what the Nazi occupation was like for Jews in Greece, but the format of this book made it a very tedious read. The first third is like one long prologue which is all "tell" and no "show" so that it reads like a history textbook. And the "telling" continues as the narrator feels the need to pre-explain every incident instead of just letting the reader experience it.

This multi-generation story of a Jewish family's experiences during the German occupation of Greece is an interesting unfolding of a familiar but always personalized story of the Holocaust and its effect on different people. The book has three different authors and each has a different style of writing. That might be its strength as well as its weakness. Some of the writing is wonderfully expressive and very touching but some of it is rather difficult to follow and to figure out who is narrating. It is possible that he book lost something in its translation and perhaps could have benefited from more deliberate editing. It's a worthwhile book to read -- it just could have been better. Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

It is not something I talk about very often but I am of Jewish descent. I grew up with my Grandparents but they were, unlike the rest of the family, nonpracticing. In fact, I mainly learned about Jewish Culture from my employers throughout the years. The story of the Jewish people throughout history is an odd, sorrow-filled tale. Parts of which I've heard many, many times. My specific interest in Jewish history is post-WWII but there is a need to revisit the war to learn why things happened to them afterward. When I see a book like this, I jump at it.

I didn't like this book at all. As the other reviewers have pointed out there are structural issues to the story. The introduction takes up 30% of the book. So instead of Isaac and his son Robert having their stories heard, we also have Isaac's Daughter-in-law (I believe) explaining everything beforehand. What I would have done would have been to write the entire book as the in-law telling the narrative and supplementing it with Isaac and Robert's writings as opposed to keeping them separate.

As far as content goes, and maybe I was too caught up in the layout of the book, but I couldn't get past the feeling that I'd already read this story somewhere before. That this specific experience wasn't as unique as I thought it would be.

To each their own. I feel terrible about not liking this but what can you do?

Talking Until Nightfall is an astonishing book. It is a moving, unusual, and heartfelt first person account of the German occupation in Salonika, Greece during WWII and the subsequent deportation and genocide of almost all the Jews from that city, over 40,000 of them. The writer is a doctor, a dermatologist, who with his son is able to escape into a mountain village to be with the Resistance, and who is also incarcerated and tortured during the Occupation. However, Dr. Isaac Matarasso is able to escape deportation. He published this account in Greek in 1948, and his daughter-in-law, Pauline Motarasso, has recently translated it into English. Dr. Matarasso went to medical school in France, so parts of the writing were originally also in French.

This unique memoir provides us with vignettes of the time, both poignant and horrifying. The perspective and writing of Dr. Matarasso is often poetic and generous in understanding, but he does not shy away from the realities of the genocide. Seldom is a reader so captivated by a first-person account; reading Motarasso's reminiscences and descriptions of what happened to his family and those of his fellow Jews is a literary experience of the highest level.

For those who have further interest in the topic, there is a small but skillfully created Jewish Museum and synagogue in Thessaloniki that add a frame of reference for this discussion.