Book review: The vengeance of Samuel Val by Elyse Hoffman

 

Black Coffee Book Tours

September 05-08

Samuel Val is blessed with a loving family and a tight-knit community in his Jewish village of Khruvina. He dreams of becoming Khruvina’s Rabbi, but his dreams are crushed when his family is slaughtered by Nazi Officer Viktor Naden, the Beast of Belorussia.

With Samuel left as Khruvina’s only survivor, he joins the anti-Nazi resistance group known as the Black Foxes. Determined to avenge his family, he swears to hunt down and destroy Viktor Naden. Samuel’s mission of vengeance, however, is put on hold when he is forced to escort a Jewish refugee to a safehouse operated by Black Fox Ten, a high-ranked member of the resistance.

While on his mission to save a life, Samuel discovers that the Beast of Belorussia might be closer than he thought. All at once, Samuel is given the chance to destroy Viktor Naden…but the cost will be high.

Will Samuel sell his soul for vengeance?

Award-winning author Elyse Hoffman offers a heart-breaking and thought-provoking WW2 story.

Universal link for the book on Amazon

About the author

Elyse Hoffman is an award-winning author who strives to tell historical tales with new twists. She loves to meld WWII and Jewish history with fantasy, folklore, and the paranormal. She has written six works of Holocaust historical fiction: the five books of The Barracks of the Holocaust and The Book of Uriel.

Website / Goodreads / Bookbub 

Excerpt:

“Soooo…question.”

It seemed that their nightly conversations about the Tanakh had made Amos bolder. Sam’s resistance had fractured, his father’s counsel and his inner Rabbi unwilling to leave questions about Judaism unanswered.

“What question?” Sam said, slowing down a bit to allow Amos to walk at his side rather than behind him. “You’re Russian, right?” Amos inquired, fiddling with the end of his scarf. “The accent, I mean, I’m bad at recognizing accents. One time in the Ghetto I called a Belgian woman French and that was a shitshow…”

“Yes, I’m Russian,” Samuel interrupted with not a small amount of pride. His loyalty had, for most of his life, been with Khruvina and not the ethnicity he’d been born into, but the Russians had been fighting bravely against the Nazi onslaught. Samuel was no Soviet, certainly no communist, but he was proud to be a part of such a stubbornly resilient people.

“But your German is very good!” Amos declared. “I was just wondering why you learned German, how you speak it so well. I took English in school. I could maybe get by if we bumped into a Brit or an American, but you’re practically fluent. Do they teach German in the Soviet Union?”

Sam’s heart palpitated. Whether or not the Soviet schools taught German was immaterial; Khruvina had been a village of Russian, Hebrew, and Yiddish. Samuel knew German because his father had known German, and Yonatan had known German because when German soldiers had marched into Khruvina during the Great War, they weren’t monsters. Those German soldiers were kind, civil. They sat politely in the synagogue during services. They gave chocolate to the children. There were Jews amongst them who spoke highly of their cultured nation and brought books from the great Jewish thinkers of Kaiser’s Reich. Yonatan had picked up the language of the German guests within days. He had taught his son German so that he could read the books that those soldiers had left behind.

“Maybe someday you’ll go to Germany and bump into some of those men,” Yonatan had chuckled. “They said it was nice there.”

Those good German soldiers from the Great War had damned Khruvina. Their civility put the shtetl at ease. When their countrymen became corrupted, when word had spread of a madman driving Germany into darkness, the men and women of Khruvina, who remembered chocolates and songs and shared synagogue services, had shaken their heads and refused to panic and prepare for the worst. It can’t be that bad. They were civilized. They were good.

Sam was struck by the urge to burn down the woods about him, to decimate every inch of German soil. But he glanced at the curious German following him and huffed.

“Yes,” he answered, and they continued marching through the German forest.

Review:

I received an ARC copy from the touring host for an honest opinion. Sam's story immediately touches your heart. Cici's antics were so real that I could see her climb over her family out of pure boredom. 

However, once the Nazi troops came "waltzing" in, this peaceful scenery changed into a horror movie. 

The events of that day scared Samuel Val, and all he wanted to do was to take revenge on the only person he could remember from that fateful day. 

A heartwarming story of revenge that takes you through the woods of Germany, where you experience another side of Sam. Yet, his belief was the only thing that held him upright and focused. When exactly he joined the Black Foxes is not clear, but here, he met interesting characters that added to the plotline. 

The sceneries within the muck and trenches added to the demise he and Amos experienced, like a slow burn as you continue to read. Wondering how and when he will meet this man that extinguished his entire family. 

"It wasn’t what Samuel had been expecting, either. Black Fox 120 had been ready for almost anything, but even he, well-experienced in the diverse array of men and women who joined the Black Foxes, lifted a curious brow and checked the map thrice before he conceded that they were in the right place."

Going undercover, and pretending to be part of the enemy, grated on him. This added another layer of suspense and determination and we see how this young man develops into a harsh force of realism as he begins to question his faith. 

"Though Samuel despised Germany, the German Black Foxes’ bravery and sacrifice kept him from praying that Adonai would decimate the entire nation, like Sodom and Gomorrah."

This story takes you into the very heart of the war. Where loyalty is tested and man's will to live is pulled apart. Friends become enemies and enemies become friends. A beautiful balance of suspense and human frailty during the hardest time of our human race. 

The author's writing style is clear, with enough description for one to become part of the story. A must read for all who love a Word War 11 story.