The other day, one of my sons commented on an article about a remarkable old lady, a Holocaust survivor. This was somebody who emigrated in 1938 to Palestine. She spent the war there, married another Jewish émigré who later joined the British army. “It is a nice article, but she is not really a Holocaust survivor, is she?” We talked about it. At first, I … Continue reading Who is a real Holocaust survivor?

  I visited my home town, Prague. In the research for my book, I met more people. One was Mrs. F., a 92-year-old mother of a friend, a very sharp lady who is in a Jewish residential home because she is in a wheelchair. Mrs F. was one of the lucky ones, she and her family emigrated in 1939. The story, like all those other … Continue reading With all the real testimonies and my own DNA testing, should I write the truth rather than fiction? Nope, I don’t think so.

Genocide is the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious or national group. The term was coined in 1944 by Raphael Lemkin. My cleaner comes from Bosnia. She got a political asylum in the UK in 1992. She was 16 years old. I knew that her father and 3 uncles were killed by the Serbs, but I never asked her … Continue reading Refugees – the same story again and again

I am writing a novel, using stories from my family, friends, and stories I make up. The real stories are fictionalised, and the most unbelievable.Real life is, indeed, stranger than fiction. The novel is partly about the previous generations, the Holocaust survivors or the lucky ones (or smart ones) who managed to escape. It is also about the ones who didn’t make it. But it is … Continue reading The reason why I am writing this novel

My novel is mainly about the dilemma of emigration. Most of my relatives made a mistake by staying in the Nazi occupied Czechoslovakia, or later in the communist Czechoslovakia after the war. I emigrated from the communist Czechoslovakia when it was almost not worth it- 1986. In 1989, the Communist system crumbled. I live in England. I have worked  here as a Family doctor for … Continue reading My journey- finding out about the past, and making a novel out of it.