Sentence Siberia: A Story of Survival [Paperback]

Ann Lehtmets (Author), Douglas Hoile (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1, 1994

Ann Lehtmets is one of few women in the western world to have lived through Stalin's holocaust. One morning in June 1941, Russian soldiers arrested Ann lethmets in her home in Estonia, tore her from her husband and children and loaded her in a cattle truck, destination unknown. She survived her sentence in Siberia, negotiating a life where secret police, brutish foremen and hostile landladies conspired with cold, hunger and backbreaking labour to make existence difficult for all and deadly for many. Ann Lehtmets owes her life to spirit, intelligence, guile and humor. These qualities shine through every page of her extraordinary recollections.

Editorial Reviews

Review

...enthralling, a valuable primary source for historians...grimly fascinating reading. -- The West Australian

...reminders of the innate courage and resourcefulness of those who, when tested, emerge from the contest whole. -- Australian Jewish News

Ann Lehtmets is an international treasure. -- Frank Campbell, The Australian --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

About the Author

Ann Lehtmets was born in southern Estonia in 1904 and educated at a girls' college. She settled with her lawyer husband in Rakvere, a city in northern Estonia. In 1941 she was arrested and transported to Siberia, where for 17 years she was forced to live and work in appalling conditions.

Douglas Hoile was born in South Australia in 1924. He served in the RAAF as a Spitfire pilot during WWII and later graduated in Medicine at the University of Adelaide. He married Ann Lehtmets' daughter, Tiiu, in 1953 and has worked for many years as a general practitioner involved in community service.

Product Details

• Paperback: 376 pages
• Publisher: Wakefield Press (June 1, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1862543135
• ISBN-13: 978-1862543133
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.7 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,893,214 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #77 in Books > History > Europe > Estonia

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Personal Account of Stalin's Holocaust, March 11, 2001

By 

"eiole" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sentence Siberia: A Story of Survival (Paperback)

The book is a personal account of Ann Lehtmets' deportation from Estonia (not Latvia) to Siberia in 1941. It accounts from the time she was taken from her home at gun-point by the NKVD (KGB), and for her first 2 or 3 years of her 17-year stay in a Siberian labour camp.

As a foreign-born Estonian, I took particular interest in this book- as my family chose to flee the country rather than to risk suffering the same fate (the second round of mass deportations happened in 1949).

In all, it was an interesting book. However, it was "slow" at times and I felt the ending was sort of incomplete. Her leaving Siberia and being re-united with her family after 17 years was barely mentioned in a breif 3 pages.

But a remarkable story none the less, and a highly reccomended read for all people of Estonian heritage.

4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Tale of courage, May 16, 2000

By 

BC "aceaceaceace" (NYC, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sentence Siberia: A Story of Survival (Paperback)

I bought this expecting it to be about life in the gulag labor camps. That's not exactly what it was, but it didn't matter. I really enjoyed it regardless. It is the story of a Latvian woman who is taken from her home, sent to a village in Siberia, and forced to work at backbreaking jobs to survive. Not forced at gunpoint, but, rather, in order to earn enough food to eke out a subsistence (barely) level of survival. She manages by sheer courage, creativity, wits and backbone, while many others starved and froze to death around her. Read it if you want a story of what people can do to survive, if the have the will and the strength. An amazing woman with an amazing story.

0 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A journey into my Estonian heritage, February 4, 2008

By 

L. Rebane (South Australia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Sentence Siberia: A Story of Survival (Paperback)

The author was a friend of my grandmother's. The three of us would play the card game 'Bismark' together when I was a teenager. I wish I would have known to ask her questions about her life. She was a sassy, strong, lovable woman who enjoyed her cigarettes at a precise intensity. I always remembered her saying that she was worked so hard in Siberia that the bone of her leg had almost no skin on it.