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New Books in Eastern European StudiesInterviews with Scholars of Eastern Europe about their New Books Author: New Books Network
This podcast is a channel on the New Books Network. The New Books Network is an academic audio library dedicated to public education. In each episode you will hear scholars discuss their recently published research with another expert in their field. Discover our 150 channels and browse our 28,000 episodes on our website: newbooksnetwork.com Subscribe to our free weekly Substack newsletter to get informative, engaging content straight to your inbox: https://newbooksnetwork.substack.com/ Follow us on Instagram and Bluesky to learn about more our latest interviews: @newbooksnetwork Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/eastern-european-studies Language: en Genres: History, Society & Culture Contact email: Get it Feed URL: Get it iTunes ID: Get it |
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Daniela Gerson, "The Wanderers: A Story of Exile, Survival, and Unexpected Love in the Shadow of World War II" (Grand Central Publishing, 2026)
Tuesday, 8 September, 2026
In The Wanderers: A Story of Exile, Survival, and Unexpected Love in the Shadow of World War II (Grand Central Publishing, 2026), an immigration journalist and her wife trace their family’s intertwined past to unearth a history of how hundreds of thousands of Polish Jews survived Hitler’s Holocaust at the brutal hands of Stalin—a story that sheds light on the enduring power of hope and love.Daniela Gerson and her wife, Talia Inlender, met at a picnic in Los Angeles, not knowing that 75 years earlier, their grandparents had left homes only blocks away from each other in a small Polish town, and fled east to Ukraine. The Gersons and the Inlenders would go on parallel odysseys of 5,000 miles to survive the Holocaust—journeys that would, after a deceitful loyalty test from Stalin, put them on cattle cars to a Soviet Gulag, trap them for years in limbo in Central Asia, and would end, after a decade on the run, with new lives built on secrets and lies.For years, Daniela and Talia simply accepted this painful shared history as a sign that they were b’shert, meant to be. Their families’ refugee past fueled their work: Daniela as an immigration journalist; Talia an immigration attorney. But as Daniela uncovered more, she realized that their grandparents shared this escape path in the Soviet Union with most Polish Jews who survived; a group—sometimes collectively called “the Wanderers”—that is almost entirely absent from popular understanding of World War II. And unlike most Holocaust sagas that focus on the exceptionality of the Nazi genocide, theirs was also a universal story of refugees making impossible decisions when forced to seek safety, protect their children, and find new homes. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/eastern-european-studies
