The Kaminsky Cure

“Well, here I am at five and three quarters. It's Christmas 1939 in a little Austrian village in Hitler's Third Reich and I'm just beginning to notice things. Like what my brothers and sisters are about and why my parents are often crying and my father usually shouting when he isn't crying. I think it has something to do with the war we're fighting, which according to the wireless is due to The International Jewish Conspiracy, whatever that is, but that's not all. I don't know it yet, but I was born at the wrong time and in the wrong place.” Thus begins the innocent narration of The Kaminsky Cure, a poignant yet comedic novel of a half Jewish/half Christian family caught up in the machinery of Hitler's final solution. The matriarch, Gabi, was born Jewish but converted to Christianity in her teens. The patriarch, Willibald, is a Luthern minister who, on one hand is a proud Aryan, but on the other hand, the conflicted father of children who are half-Jewish. Mindful and resentful of her husband's ambivalence, Gabi is determined to make sure her children are educated, devising schemes to keep them in school even after learning that any child less than 100% Aryan will eventually be kept from completing education. She even hires tutors who are willing to teach half-Jewish children and in this way comes to hire Fraulein Kaminsky who shows Gabi how to cure her frustration and rage: to keep her mouth filled with water until the urge to scream or rant has passed. Willibald Brinkmann, a Lutheran pastor, has more than a sneaking admiration for Hitler, something his Jewish wife Gabi is unable to share. It's 1933 when the Brownshirts tell Willibald to 'go find another twig to perch on', and he loses no time abandoning his prestigious Berlin parish. Humiliated and resentful, Willibald finds refuge in the tiny village of Heimstatt high in the Austrian Alps, where Gabi's last child - and narrator of the story - is born. Then the Nazis arrive in Austria. Gabi struggles to protect her family against the ever-tightening vice of persecution and the remorseless approach of the Final Solution. Terrifying yet darkly humorous, The Kaminsky Cure is the story of Gabi Brinkmann's fight to keep her family alive in a world determined to destroy them. 'A masterly work, one that can stand proudly alongside Günter Grass's The Tin Drum' Moris Farhi 'A child's-eye view makes delusion and hypocrisy shockingly stark ... well researched and entertaining.' Guardian 'An extravaganza of colourful characters' Washington Post Gabi, was born Jewish but converted to Christianity in her teens. Her husband is a Lutheran minister who, on one hand is a proud Aryan, but on the other hand, the conflicted father of children who are half-Jewish. Mindful and resentful of her husbands ambivalence, Gabi is determined to make sure her children are educated, devising schemes to keep them in school even after learning that any child less than 100% Aryan will eventually be kept from completing education. She even hires tutors who are willing to teach half-Jewish children and in this way comes to hire Fraulein Kaminsky who shows Gabi how to cure her frustration and rage: to keep her mouth filled with water until the urge to scream or rant has passed.--page 2 of cover. Willibald Brinkmann has more than a sneaking admiration for Hitler - something his Jewish wife Gabi is unable to share. It's 1933, and the humiliated Willibald is forced to find refuge in a village in Austrian Alps. Then the Nazis arrive in Austria. This is the story of Gabi fight to keep her family alive in a world determined to destroy them.