Appel is Forever

Born in Amsterdam in 1935, Suzanne Mehler Whiteley saw ravages of war through a child'seyes. Her memoir, written in the voice of a young girl, describes the years before the invasion of Holland, her experiences during the German occupation, her time spent in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, and her childhood afterward in Europe and then the United States. A holocaust survivor who is now trained as a therapist, the author tells not only what it was like to witness the horrors of Bergen-Belsen but also how a child set about resuming the business of growing up after. She shares the sense of dislocation afer the war and the hope that was restored by emigrating to the United States.

Appel is Forever describes in a child's words the atrocities that should never be seen by anyone. Through young Suzanne's introspection, readers are invited to see beyond the history of events to their deeper meaning. We come to see how the miracle of having survived opens a child up to the potential for playfulness and even happiness, while a young girl's observations of coming to her new country touch upon the promises and hardships of the American dream.--Bulletin of the Arnold and Leona Finker Institute of Holocaust Research

Suzanne Mehler Whiteley, a Holocaust survivor, is now a trained therapist in private practice in Evanston, Illinois.