Customer Reviews

Hearts of Fire

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Hearts Of Fire is a historical soga that lets you step back into time to feel the pain, the suffering, and experience the outrageous pre and post war human activites that have exsisted in our past. I would place this book up along the side of the classic, The Diary Of Anne Frank. It wouldn't surprise me in the least if one day this book makes it to the movie screen. You will catch yourself crying, laughing, feeling all the emotions that the characters feel. Do yourself a favor and read this book. Set into time when many of us would dare to remember. And many would seem so eager to forget. I promise you, you won't forget this book.

I have been waiting for a long time to find a book like "Hearts of Fire"...Both my husband and I loved the book and could not put it down once we started reading. The author makes the characters come alive right from the first page. The reader cannot help but get involved. I felt like I was living the characters lives with them. What a wonderful book.

What a fabulous book!!! This is one of those novels you EXPERIENCE rather than just read. As you follow this incredible journey you literally feel a whole host of emotions - pain, sadness, hope, pity, loathing, happiness, and ultimately a tugging at your heartstrings that leaves you feeling fulfilled and satisfied, yet longing for more.

Spanning a few decades and travelling to such places as Poland, Dachau Concentration Camp, France, England, Israel, Russia, and the United States, this novel accomplishes an enormous task of telling (or re-telling?) the multi-dimensional saga of a number of fascinating indivduals whose lives are interconnected in incredible ways.

You'll read about fate, power struggles, deception, hypnosis, hatred, murder, love, overcoming obstacles, betrayal, rebirth, and most of all the power of love and hope in the future. These characters and their story will stay with you long after the novel has ended and you'll be giving copies to your friends and family and telling them its a "must-read."

Despite my glowing review, I have one small criticism - at times I thought the writing slightly weak a/o the diaglogue not the most realistic. That being said, the saga is so powerful that it overcomes any lack there may be in the writing style.

Beginning in 1919 through sometime in the present, Hearts of Fire by Ellen Brazer, tells the story of two very different families before during and after WWII. German twins, a boy and a girl raisd by an abusive father, become enamored with Hitler and his views. At the same time a Jewish Polish family's world is rocked by the war and its consequences.

Although there were parts which I enjoyed like the first 100 pages, the book seemed too coincidental towards the end and hardly credible. Perhaps the book attempted to tell too much of a story over several decades but by the end the book seemed to become more of a soap opera than one which informed the reader about the war and its consequences. And while there have been unbelievable and coincidental true stories concerning WWII and survivors on both sides, the story presented in Hearts of Fire just didn't seem plausible.Perhaps the greatest failing of this book were the last few pages which tied up several decades into the neatest and happiest ending but also left too many unanswered questions. Bottom line is that this book wasn't as good as other books which I've read on this subject specifically Exodus by Leon Uris and Winds of War and War and Remembrance by Herman Wouk. This book was highly recommended to me and I only wished I had enjoyed it more and could have rated it higher. Since I always seem to gravitate towards books on this subject, I really looked forward to reading this title and was unfortunately disappointed in the end.

After reading Clouds Across the Sun I couldn't wait to read this book. The first half was good but then it became too familiar. The second half was basically a repeat of the Clouds book! It appeared to be word for word the same chapters as the Clouds story. I felt I was reading the same book over again. I very disappointed I had bought this book. Read one or the other and you'll enjoy it.