In 1995 the author was one of eighteen Auschwitz survivors to return to the Bavarian resort town where the American army had liberated her and other skeletal prisoners 50 years earlier. The former mayor's son was nine years old in 1945. As an adult he had tried to describe the human suffering witnessed then as Auschwitz survivors emerged into the town; he had found post-war generations unwilling to believe his account of that ghastly liberation, so he arranged the dedication of a memorial tribute and invited survivors to attend. Following that visit, the author began to write about her memories. Her personal account begins when she was a 15-year-old living in a small Hungarian town and ends when in 1951 she sails past the Statue of Liberty. Her memoir takes the form of a diary in which she unfolds in excruciating detail what she remembers from the time she spent in the camp. She writes, "My story is my message. Never give up." Her riveting Holocaust narrative is certain to find a large readership. (Age 12-adult)