Night

Rating:
Summary: Not what I expected
Review: The book Night was reccommended to me by a friend who made it seem absolutely intriguing. I started into the book with the expectation that I'd be blown away, but at the end of the book I was slightly dissappointed.
The book night is an account of the authors experiences during the Holocaust. I personally found the novel very shallow and not indepth. The characters were just touched upon briefly without enough background or knowledge of their true personalities or identities. For me a video shown in a History class would be the comparison to this book. It told the same tragic stories of Nazi Germany that are easily recognizable by many of us. If you're looking for a quick, easyread book that doesn't create much thought then this would be the book for you. But if you're like me and enjoy books with more of a plot then I reccommend you skip over this peice and move on to a more advanced novel.

Rating:
Summary: short and powerful
Review: Night is defintely one of the most powerful books I have ever read. It's fairly short but the level of detail given in Night really show what the Holocaust was really like for those who went through it. It's definitly something that everyone should read because it shows how far people are willing to take their hate against others.

Rating:
Summary: Chilling-but it needed to be written
Review: The horrors of the Holocaust are gone, thankfully, but they cannot be forgotten, especially with the scourge of some current events. Elie has done well by writing about the horrors- the evil doctor who decided who got burned up, the fights for food, the executions that the Jews were forced to watch, and most tragically, the death of Elie's father-which he missed because they took him away. It chills you to the bone, but you must read it; the horrors of the Holocaust cannot be forgotten.

Rating:
Summary: Stunned
Review: This book left me stunned. People talk a lot of The Diary of Anne Frank, but this book gives more of an overall view of the situation because it was writeen after the fact. This book will amaze you. I often think that people who still hold on to racist and prejudice feelings for any group should read this book and see through the eyes of someone who lived this terrifying hell. I keep hoping this book will change their minds.

Rating:
Summary: Really, really powerful
Review: NIGHT is the dramatic story of Wiesel and his family who are first imprisioned in a ghetto, and then sent to concentration camps, where they are split up for good. This story is dark, and deals with very mature material. Easy to read, but far from easy to accept, I think that NIGHT is a book that everyone should read at some point in his or her life.

Rating:
Summary: My Life will Never Be the Same
Review: The title of this book says it all. In one night after reading this book, my whole out look has changed. I am forever grateful to the honorable Elie Wiesel for having the courage and strength to relive and narrarate his experience, not only as a witness but as a participant of the Holocaust, providing his readers his indelible message through the masterpiece of his manuscript. In this somber and haunting tale, Mr. Wiesel captured my attention, for better or worse. As he described his heart pounding in moments of great terror, I too felt my heart pounding. I could feel his suspense, his anguish, his pain, his confusion, his contempt, and his fear. As an adult and a mother, I felt nauseous with his descriptions of the victims, the children, and ached and hoped for the longing of a reunification with his family members, hoping some miracle would stop this nightmare of reality. Oh, I so longed for him to reunify with his mother and his sister, so that he could go home and live a life that so many of us take for granted, nowadays. As I kept reading, I would find myself wondering and asking God, Why? Why? Why? I felt relieved to know that Mr. Wiesel too questioned God, felt anger towards God, but at the same time showed his respect towards God. Such ambivalence...such a real person...who experienced a myriad of emotions, feelings, and a whirlwind of despair in a surreal circumstance. I kept asking myself if what I was reading was "real" or "surreal" questioning myself, how could this happen? Why did this happen? Why didn't anyone stop it from happening? I felt heart-sick for Mr. Wiesel and all of the other prisoners. Mr. Wiesel's story is terrifying but a constant reminder that if we don't learn our history, we are bound to repeat it. I personally believe this book should be in every person's bookcase and taught everywhere, so that this vile display of what humans can do to each other is not forgotten and not repeated or ignored. By Mr. Wiesel surviving this torment, he is a living testament that the human spirit is strong, courageous and can triumph even with only a glimmer of hope in the midst of such horrific darkness. There is no excuse to be a victim. We are all capable of being survivors. The human mind is a terrible thing to waste. Because of Mr. Wiesel's account, I will never look at my life in the same spoiled and complacement way that I once did a night ago. I have changed. I now have respect for the breath that I breathe. I now have respect for the opportunites bestowed upon me. Living in this lifetime is a gift. Things that were so-called important to me yesterday are no longer. The definition of life is love, breathing, and the art of literacy. God bless Mr. Wiesel for giving his readers the gift of his life through his words...Thank you God for using Mr. Wiesel as an instrument to spread the word of the importance of life and for giving us his testimony of his Holocaust experience...Mr. Wiesel's book will leave an indelible mark on the human soul and should be read and shared with as many who are open to hear his important and significant message of life...Leticia Araujo Perez, author

Rating:
Summary: 100 Powerful Pages
Review: The people who rate this book badly because of its disturbing content seem to be missing both the point of the novel and the point of the whole amazon.com rating system. You do not rate a book from one to five stars on the basis of how "peaceful," "beneviolent," or "pleasant" the nature of the story itself is! I think most people realize that but I just wanted to mention it anyway - cause it is funny to see people who rate books like this 1-star because it dealt with "bad" things and therefore must be a "bad" book.
Night is a tremendously important and very readable book. It is the story of a teenage boy's imprisonment in Nazi concentration camps, including Auchewitz. Night raises many issues in the context of the Holocaust. The central idea is probably the dubiousness of God: how, after all, could any God worth the name oversee such atrocities? But there are many sub-dilemmas as well, thought provoking in their own rights. Read it and find out.
I don't want to take the power out of Night at all, but I'll also say that it seems like a lot of people think that this is a word-by-word factual account of Elie Wiesel's Holocaust experience. In fact, this book is classified as "autobiography" - when it is actually not. Certainly there is a huge element of fact in Night, and the actuality of the Holocaust was as bad if not worse than is presented in this book are in the book. Think of a story similar to Eliezer's happening six million times over and you will understand the Holocaust had a scope and magnitude that cannot be contained in one book. But remember that Night is a novel.

Rating:
Summary: Slim novel of terrifying power
Review: Elie Wiesel's "Night" is -- as the NY Times described it -- a slim novel of terrifying power.

I had visited Dachau a few years ago, and it was a very moving experience. Barracks, furnaces, courtyard, and the iron gate with the words in German "Work Will Set You Free" -- same as in Wiesel's description of Auschwitz.

This book provides a petrifying 1st hand 1st person of a 15 year old Jewish Hungarian from the ghettos, deportation, labor camps, and Auschwitz, and "selection". Horror upon numbing horror climaxing in the witnessing of the death of his father.

Extremely disturbing...but mandatory reading so that "Never again..."

Rating:
Summary: Night
Review: The book is trilling and exciting and each time you stop reading it you want to read more of and keep going. I would recommend the book to people who want to read something catchy and powerful. The author's style of writing is so penetrating and piercing to your mind and soul.

Rating:
Summary: A Masterpiece in Holocaust Literature
Review: If I had a list of required reading for the entire human population, Elie Wiesel's masterpiece, "Night", would be at the top of the list.

Reaching back into his Nazi-tormented childhood, Wiesel utilizes a rare literary talent: the ability to convey a child's impressions and experiences during one of the darkest times in our history through the wisdom of an adult's eyes. His unique power of words, combined with his incredible courage and fierce determination, continue to amaze me each time I read this book.

To one who has never read an autobiography on the Holocaust: brace yourself. To one who considers her or himself to be an authority on the Holocaust: brace yourself. For what is contained in these pages is like nothing you have seen nor read, and it is nothing like you will ever see nor read again.

I won't describe the details of "Night" -- not for fear of negatively impacting the experience first-time readers will have when they take this book into their hands -- but out of respect for the realization that I am simply incapable of doing so. It is a journey that each reader must take on her or his own.

For those of us lucky enough to never have experienced the horrific tragedy that was the Holocaust, it is the very least that we can do.