Review coming soon.

I thought that this book was really good. Some of the things that I read about I had never heard of before and I have read many books about the Frank family. One of those things that I never heard of before was that Miep Gies had someone living in her apartment also in hiding. Something that I found interesting was how much the radio helped them. During the whole book, they kept referring to how they used the radio to gather information and I think that without the radio it would make staying in hiding a lot harder for them. Something that I also found interesting was that after the war Miep didn’t want to read any of Anne’s Diary and that she had been keeping while in the Annex but when she finally did she didn’t feel the way that she thought that she would. I enjoyed reading a different perspective of someone who was living during that time and was helping people hide.

I first read "The Diary of Anne Frank" when I was in junior high, and I also was the stage manager for the play depicting the Frank family's life in hiding. I like to think I knew a lot about the Frank's, this perspective from Miep, however, brought them all to life in new and eye-opening ways. More than anything, I couldn't stop thinking about how many people shared Anne's fate that we don't know anything about. Her sister, Margot, for example, also kept a diary but it was never found. Her mother. the van Daan family...and those are just a small handful of the millions of stories from this one war. There are millions more to tell, millions more happening right now. When I think about that, how many people are suffering, how many are being target, and how many people are risking it all to help them...it's almost too much for my heart to handle. The best and worst of humanity is captured in Anne's story, and in all the anonymous stories for the millions of people around the world who suffered and continue to suffer her same fate.

one of the best books i ever read for school. that's all i have to say.

part of a series i'm doing in which i review books i read a long time ago

"Não sou uma heroína. Estou no fim de uma longa, muito longa fila de bondosos holandeses que fizeram o mesmo - ou muito mais - que eu no curso daqueles tempos sombrios e tenebrosos, que, no coração de todos os que os testemunhámos, parecem ter acontecido ontem."

Um livro mandatório para se ler em complemento ao diário de Anne Frank, pois iremos perceber toda a dinâmica por de trás das vivências do Anexo e como existiram pessoas dispostas a sacrificarem-se por esta família.

Miep já tinha um lugar especial no meu coração, mas depois de ler este livro ganhou todo o meu coração! Uma mulher com um espirito de luta e de resiliência, que não se considera heroína e com tudo ao longo de toda a 2ª Guerra Mundial tentou desempenhar um papel de ativista.

Conhecer as restantes personagens aos olhos de uma mulher adulta e não de uma adolescente faz com que tomemos outra perspetiva acerca das vivências do anexo, talvez vá reler o Diário de Anne Frank com esta nova visão. Também gostei de saber mais acerca do que os holandeses suportaram ao longo dos anos, penso que foram um povo com muito sentido de revolta, organizando greves para que as leis opressoras dos Nazis pudessem ser revogadas (contudo sem grandes efeitos)

Recomendo vivamente que leiam este livro! Por tudo o que representa e por sabermos que existiram mais Mieps naquele país que de tudo fez para lutar!


"Às vezes, quando sentia que tinha esgotado as minhas forças, persistia um pouco mais e, usando uma reserva de energia que nem eu sabia que tinha, conseguia arranjar mais força e resistir"

As i have previously read anne franks diary it was inter to read what happened from Miep Gies’ perspective. And just like the diary this book was hard to put down once you start. I am usually not one much interested in afterwords and other extra information after the story has ended but in this case i soaked up every extra information there was. I am grateful for every single person that no matter how hard it was told their story. It is important to never forget so this will never happen again.

The story as told by Miep Gies adds context and understanding to The Diary Anne Frank. I found it very satisfying to hear of Miep's fondness for Anne and her entire family including the fact that Otto Frank came to live with Miep and her husband after the was. As I read the diary years ago, I wondered what was happening among their friends as they helped and felt deep concern for the eight persons in the attic. Miep tells not only that but also the experience she and her husband in the underground, their interactions with Nazis and their struggle to find food for themselves and others. Miep tells the story in a careful, considerate, and credible manner. I was touched by her precision and her courage.

Review to come.

Miep will forever be a hero in my heart, a courageous bold fearless woman who gave of herself for so many years to stand up against injustice. Of all the accounts I've read of this unbelievable horror, I still stand in utter shock of what actually happened to millions of innocent people. Let us never forget and use this as a lesson to be brave in the face of persecution in any form. My heart is broken again.

This book had me in floods of tears. Miep's modesty is really touching. At one point I asked myself if I had been in Miep's situation would I have done the same without hesitation as she did? I just don't know but I sincerely hope so.
On the other side of the coin I am actually Jewish, so in reality it would have been the other way around, and I would have been hoping and praying for my own Miep Gies.
The most touching memorial to Anne Frank I've read as yet, and a most extraordinary account of an extraordinary woman. Even if, in her ceaseless humility she did not believe herself to be so.

Very happy to have listened to this. No surprises and not much complexity, but it's well told, important and fills in a great deal about Anne or her surroundings. Of course it's terribly moving, even when Miep tells us the one thing she would like to say, now that she is 100 years old, is how lucky she was. The reader, Barbara Rosenblat, was excellent.

I recently reread, "The Diary of Anne Frank" and while it is a very moving and wonderful journal it left me with so many questions about how the hiding place really worked out for so many months. The answer is Miep Gies. Now she was an amazing woman. Vienna born and Dutch by marriage she was a good friend to the Frank family and worked in Otto Frank's pectin store front for many years before they went into hiding. She shopped and came for visits and offered comfort and support to the people in the annex daily. Some days she would have to shop for hours before she found enough food with all the shortages and rationing to feed the group. Her husband Henk was a member of the resistance party and they had a Jew hiding in their own apartment rooms too. I was just amazed at how devoted she (and the few other office workers who knew) was to those in her care. The business was changed into one of the office workers names so that it could continue to flourish even during the war. Mr. Frank would still make plans and decisions from the annex and Anne and Margot would come down at night and do office work for Miep and Elli (an office girl). Miep talks about the day the whole group was arrested and how she and Henk even twenty plus years later still observed a day of silence in memory of their friends. Miep went to Nazi headquarters and met with the highest ranked Nazi available and asked to buy the Franks back with no luck right after they were arrested. When Mr. Frank was released he lived with Miep, Henk, and their son Paul for eight years before he moved and remarried. During this time he was distributing Anne's diary which Miep had illegally recovered from the annex the day they were arrested. She kept all the pages in an unlocked drawer in her office desk and never looked at them. She safely returned them to Mr. Frank the day he was sent word that Anne and Margot had died in the prison camp. Such an inspiring woman and book.