The Triumph of Love

This novel demonstrates how in the midst of horror and violence, love can triumph above all.

The author creates a vivid picture of a place that is defined by horror, yet from within this scene she paints a love story that leaves the reader with a sense of hope. She emphasizes the setting by depicting the prisoners themselves building the structures of the concentration camp. The architectural layout of Auschwitz is designed to be destructive; Lale watches the buildings be erected around him with horror because he knows that they are built to lodge, torture, and kill thousands of his own people. Further into the novel, Lale observes that the mechanisms of the concentration camp resembled “production lines of death” (128). And yet, a beautiful love story takes place within this dismal scene.

The central focus of this novel is the relationship between Lale...