Hidden Inheritance: Family Secrets, Memory, and Faith
With a simple click on a website, Heidi Neumark’s knowledge of herself, her belief system, and her heritage was irrevocably changed. In this compelling memoir, Neumark, a Lutheran pastor, learned that her father had Jewish roots and that some of her relatives, including her own grandfather, perished during the Holocaust.
Neumark shares her journey of self-discovery with the reader, an expedition that took her to Wittmund, Germany where she learned that her grandfather and other members of her family were quite prominent in the Jewish community, and to the concentration camp Theresienstadt, where her grandparents were imprisoned. While trying to piece together the background story and why her parents remained stone silent, Neumark uncovered never-before-heard stories and met relatives that she never knew she had.
Already a champion for societal outcasts in her ministry work, Neumark tells her story with compassion and pathos. Her writing is simultaneously conversational and insightful. People of all faiths and backgrounds can find something hopeful to take away from this remarkable book.
