Nazis force Mates Bruner, a Jew growing up in Poland, to build the very concentration camps that kill his people. He escapes and is hidden by a courageous farmer, but at the end of the war he discovers that of his entire family, only his two sisters have survived.
Wanda Drapacz and her family avoid the concentration camps...but not the effects of the conflict, deported to Russia where they suffer hunger and disease in harsh conditions.
Both survivors, Wanda and Mates eventually marry-but happiness doesn't come easily. The impact of their experiences linger for years to come, periodically erupting into episodes of domestic violence. Their fight for survival isn't over.
Written by their son, Samuel Solomon Bruner, this raw and gripping account details their struggle-and shows that the hell of war didn't end in 1945-it crept on and struck out at children and other family members, as well as those who also faced death and survived.
"From Hell's Heart has literally been raked from the ashes of the Holocaust," says reader and Samuel's high school English teacher, Bruce L. Marcoon. Their story burns in this emotional memoir.
About the Author: Author Samuel Solomon Bruner grew up with stories of the Holocaust being used as instructions on how to deal with life's problems. Those stories live on in From Hell's Heart: A Memoire of Holocaust Survivors and Their Son.
Bruner graduated from West Virginia University in 1977 with a bachelor's degree in journalism. He traveled extensively both before and after college, experiencing different cultures, history, and religions.
He joined with his brother in the jewelry industry and later studied law at Widener School of Law in Wilmington, Delaware. Bruner now works as a trial and family law attorney and regularly represents victims in domestic violence cases.
He and his wife, Deborah, live in Atlanta.
