Rating: 
Summary: Let bygones be bygones
Review: I felt mixed emotions about "Betty's choice". She wrote that she honored her values of family and didn't want to have Richie leave his family (with a 7-yr-old) nor for her own children to suffer. She modeled the behavior she would want her children to have.
It's as if she matured and realized that it's not as black and white as it appeared in her youth---that there are many things to consider besides her own immediate desires.---In fact, she gave into her own immediate desires when she married Otto. She tries to make it seem like Otto and her mother arranged for her to marry him but she said "I do". She didn't think ahead to how she would feel if Richie wasn't in fact dead. Perhaps she was influenced by her father missing for so long---and never returning.
But the fact remains that it was HER CHOICE to marry Otto. But she didn't decide to LOVE him. That came later...after she saw Richie and made a decision to stay with her husband and let bygones be bygones.
Rating: 
Summary: Am I the only one?
Review: I have just finished reading To See You Again. It was the selection for my Woman's Book Group this month. How all of the people writing reviews for this book report it to be "wonderfully written" is just beyond me. A page turner? Far from it. Many nights I opted to watch television, which, as a avid reader I never do, because the book did not entice me enough to wish to bunker down to finish it. If I didn't know better I would have said this book was written by a junior high school student! The writing is as horrific as the story Betty has to tell. If one were to do an analysis on the grade level it is written on I am sure it would fall in the single digits. Betty often repeats herself and any writer who uses the descriptive "great" as often as Ms. Schmimmel does in her book needs to study the written art form more thoroughly.
Beyond the simplistic writing, though, lies a story that leaves the reader with many questions. The most apparent one is "how did this woman who hadn't seen her lover in thirty years recognize him across a crowded restaurant just by seeing the back of his head?" I sometimes cannot even recognize the man I have been married to for fifteen years if I only have the back of his head to go on.
I feel for the suffering Betty endured, and guess that that is what transformed her into such a mean and ruthless person. She treated her husband, who loved her unconditionally, miserably. Then when given the chance to leave him, decided to stay with him. She complained throughout the entire book.
She skimmed the surface concerning her children and how they affected her life and concentrated so much on her inner demons that it made for a shallow book. She tries to optimize on the horror she suffered and it only goes so far.
This is a convuluted story that leaves me wondering what love really is after all.
Rating:
Summary: YES....THIS STORY IS FACT
Review: I have met Betty Schimmel and her husband Otto. How anyone can say her story is fiction is beyond me. Yes, both Betty and her husband Otto survived the concentration camps. The deep emotions of her story are still evident in her voice and face. This is a true life story about both the horrors of war and being a Jew in WWII Europe and of true love.True, this is not an ending to give away. Read Betty's story. It will rip your heart in many directions. You will not be disappointed. You will not be able to put this book down.
Rating:
Summary: To See You Again
Review: I have read countless Holocaust memoirs but this book was EXCEPTIONALLY well written! From the first sentence on page one Betty seems to "take your hand" and brings you completely into her life. I could NOT put this book down and felt I was at Betty's side every step of the way! Her unbelievable story tore at my heart, and by the end of the book my emotions ran so high I simply cried and cried. An ABSOULTE MUST READ for anyone interested in the Holocaust (or anyone who needs a quick reminder as to just how lucky we were not to have had to endure such hell on earth). I am convinced I will never read a more poignant (true) story such as this one. TEN STARS FOR THIS BOOK!
Rating:
Summary: A gut wrenching story of love, war and amazing courage.
Review: I normally would not be drawn to love stories, nor stories involving the holocaust. However, this book was impossible to put down. I would highly recommend this book to anyone looking to get a better feel for what life was like under Nazi rule, and to hear an amazing story of a love that never died.
Rating:
Summary: A 10 star riveting book
Review: I still have not finished reading this book and absolutely cannot put it down. Reading about Betty's great love, then losing it only to find it again during a horrific period in her life and in history, wartime Budapest, has kept me up at nights wanting to reach back into time and right all the wrongs she has suffered. Never, never, NEVER has a book been so well written. This book runs through all the emotions and I will never forget Betty Schimmel's story! A definite 10 star book if there ever was one.
Rating:
Summary: How an hour a day changed my life forever...
Review: It began as a way to make my car ride to college every day more interesting. I decided I was going to stop listening to the same old music on the radio every day, and instead start listening to audio books. This way I could spend the 35 minute commute to school in a more positive, educational way. Sadly, I found my school library's audio book section very limited, but I was determined to choose on. After searching one caught my eye. "To see you again," by Betty Schimmel. It seemed interesting enough, something to keep my attention, so I got it, and popped it in the second I started home. To my surprise the book captured me like none had ever before. Betty's words were so realistic, so straight to the point and didn't cover anything up with fairy dust. It was about life and everything involved in it. It wasn't just about the Holocaust, or the war, or the horrors surrounding it. It wasn't about her experiences in the camps or losing her friends and family. It was about life and how complicated it really is. I'd find myself in my driveway, waiting for the right time to turn it off. I'd be in the car laughin so hard my cheeks hurt, or crying so hard my face stung. Every day as the story went on, I would come home and share my experience of Betty Schimmel with my mom who was captured by it just as I was. We even sat and listen to the last 45 minutes of it together. I will never forget Betty as long as I live. For her story of life, as simple as we all wish it could be, is in us all.
Rating:
Summary: WHY READ FICTION?
Review: It blew me away that this is a true story. I kept thinking of a real young woman experiencing the euphoria of young love in romantic Budapest, her terror of the increasingly shocking Nazi atrocities, and her resulting confusion and resentment. And what a humdinger of a climax -- true to boot! This book is beautifully written -- straight from the heart. I couldn't put it down.
Rating:
Summary: One of the most amazing books I've read
Review: Not very many books make me cry..this one DID! Betty Schimmel is an amazing survivor and has a story that I will probably never forget. I do not understand how people can call her "selfish" or or say she complained too much. She endured and survived the most cruelest circumstances and her story tells how strong love can be even in the darkest times. If someone can read this book and not feel any emotion something is wrong. This book makes you realize how lucky we are to enjoy freedom and health. I read this book more than a year ago and it still touches my life.
Rating:
Summary: One of the best love stories I've ever read!
Review: One night I was listening to the radio and there was a guest who was telling a story that I had never heard anything like. I was intriged and listened intently for about twenty minutes. The story this man was telling was one of his mother's discovery of her long lost love. His mother and sister had taken a trip to Europe where they saw a heart carved in a wall with his mother's and another man's initials. His mother then told his sister her story of love that was destroyed by the war. At the end of the man's interview, he mentioned that his mother had written a book and that there was a movie in the making about her story. The very next day I bought the book and I read it in just a few short hours. I couldn't put it down. I have never read a true love story of this magnitude. It is the perfect tale for all who dream of true love.
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