Jonathan Freedland’s superb writing fills the reader with rage, despair, and admiration for the stubborn resistance of the human spirit. It is heart-wrenching to read the story of Rudolf Vrba, who is a mere nineteen years of age, and his fellow concentration camp inmate Fred Wetzler, who is twenty-six. It is the spring of 1944, and the two young men are enduring a harrowing incarceration in Auschwitz when the extraordinary happens. Melding their minds and spirits, they hatch an outrageous plan: They will be the first Jews ever to escape from the highly guarded prison. Once the world knows, they are certain that steps will be taken to save the Jews in Europe.