Donbas: A True Story of an Escape Across Russia [Paperback]

Jacques Sandulescu (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 30, 2000

A boy becomes a man of truly heroic dimensions in this stark story of escape across Russia in the dead of winter.The Fresno Bee Riveting suspenseOnce started I could not stop, once done could not forget it. Ever.Lael Wertenbaker, The Berkshire Eagle Simply written, direct and extraordinarily movinga very old-fashioned, very personal story that, in this most negative of ages, is an unassuming statement of deep affirmation.John Leonard, The New York Times Book Review

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Excellent portrayal of a youth's indomitable spirit and will to survive." -- Library Journal

About the Author

Born in Romania and educated in Stalins slave labor camps, Jacques Sandulescu has also been a pro heavyweight, a café and jazz bar owner, advisor to the worldwide Kyokushin Karate organization, an actor in movies, TV and commercials, and author (Hungers Rougues, The Carpathian Caper).

Product Details

• Paperback: 264 pages
• Publisher: iUniverse (November 30, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0595150438
• ISBN-13: 978-0595150434
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #315,082 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars perhaps the greatest escape story I've ever read, April 3, 2007

By 

Jesse Kornbluth "Head Butler" (New York) - See all my reviews
(TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Donbas: A True Story of an Escape Across Russia (Paperback)

When I met Jacques Sandulescu, I was a pasty college kid whose idea of exertion involved a highlighter and a textbook. Jacques was twice my age, a giant, rock hard, with hands that swallowed pens whole. Romania was deep in his past, as was his career as a professional boxer; in l968, when we met, he was a Greenwich Village bar owner.

Like Big Daddy Lipscomb --- the legendary giant of a football player who used to help opponents up "so the children won't think Big Daddy's mean" --- Jacques was a calming force in every room he entered. You couldn't imagine trouble erupting with him around; he was that big and strong. And, at the same time, peaceful --- he had the kind of calm only people who have passed through fire seem to know.

It wasn't until I read his book that I understood the horror Jacques survived.

"I was arrested in Brasov on my way to school," his book begins. And right there your stomach sinks. Because you know what's coming: a terrible story, told in unadorned prose.

Well, brace yourself, you're about to be devastated.

As "Donbas" opens, Jacques is 16 years old, 6 feet 2 inches tall, 180 pounds. He's the youngest person in the box car filled with Romanians that the Russians are shipping east in January of 1945. But his youth vanishes fast when he watches guards execute some would-be escapees. On one hand, he envies their death: "no more cold, misery, hunger." On the other, he wants to live. Which means he'll have to escape.

This is a book about noticing everything, paying sharp attention, looking for an opening. His first conclusion: Don't try to escape in winter, don't think you can get out of Russia without knowing Russian.

But after a few days of working in the mines of Donbas (now considered part of the Ukraine), his thoughts turn from escape to survival. The work is wet and cold. A cave-in could come at any time. Exhaustion, exposure, hunger --- death comes in many forms here.

I have never read an account of work in a coal mine that made me so claustrophobic. I found myself reading faster, as if getting to the end of a particularly horrible shift would provide some relief. But it didn't --- above ground, there were sadistic guards and icy winds. "Many prisoners died," Jacques reports matter-of-factly. "Over half the camp. Four hundred and fifty weak and sick weren't suffering any more."

Jacques is comparatively well off. He is strong and uncomplaining, a good worker. He gets privileges --- when he goes to nearby homes for dinner, it's a delight to read as he eats and eats and eats. But he's never fooled; there's always a power-mad guard around the corner. And one does beat him so badly he almost dies. Which makes it all the more satisfying when, with the permission of a senior officer, Jacques stomps that sadist mercilessly. "It was a good feeling while it lasted," he says. I think even a pacifist would agree.

After two and a half years, his luck runs out --- Jacques is trapped in a cave-in and rescued only by a friend's heroic efforts. He fears his legs will be amputated. He must escape. His legs are running with pus, he is a mass of sores, but he slips onto a train, hides in an open coal car and begins the slow, freezing ride to the West.

Books like this have a built-in handicap --- we know the author survived. Only the best of the breed make us forget that there's a happy ending. And this is the best; reading these pages, you will feel cold and hungry, raging with fever, wet and dispirited. But mostly, you will feel Jacques Sandulescu's spirit, his unyielding insistence on life, life in free air, life at all costs. And, after you put his book down, you will, literally, take a deep breath

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Stranger than the truth, September 17, 2001

By 

Robert B. Lorentz "Redbeard_NV" (Boulder City, Nevada USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Donbas: A True Story of an Escape Across Russia (Paperback)

I had first heard about Jacques Sandulescu through my father, after he loaned me the book, "The Carpathian Caper", a novel by Sandulescu and Anne Gottleib. It was a Topkapi-esque adventure, about a man's return to his homeland behind the Iron Curtain after being kidnapped by Russian soldiers as a youth and shipped off to a Soviet slave labor camp, escaping after a mine cave-in crushed his legs, escaping to freedom, working his way West from black marketeer in the Middle East and Europe, to prize fighter in the midwest to nightclub owner in New York. It deals with his friend's plans to embarass the Russian Government by the very high profile heist of priceless religious icons right from under their noses.

The lead character, Jack, was one of those impossible men, like Indiana Jones, Dirk Pitt, Jack Ryan or James Bond. Who knew that he was for real?

Donbas is his story, the true tale of a 16 year old boy's decent into the hell of the mines in the Donbas region of the USSR. His torture, his survival, his escape and his life since then is the stuff great movies are made of. So why is Hollywood sitting on their hands on this one?

Read the adventure, then rent movies like "Moscow On The Hudson", "The Owl And The Pussycat" and "Trading Places". Watch for a big, burly man with a thick Russian accent and say hello to Jacques.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Donbas, February 14, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Donbas: A True Story of an Escape Across Russia (Paperback)

This is a surprising tale of human survival and the spirit to go on. In unbearably harsh conditions a young man fights a battle of survival with an uncommon strength of will that sees him battle through a nightmarish world we could only vaguely imagine in our darkest moments. Very insipring. If you think things are tough and you have the whole world on your shoulders, have a read of this and feel sorry for yourself no more!