All The Broken Places: The Sequel to The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas

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Devlin, Martina (2022-09-22). "All The Broken Places by John Boyne: A sister's lifetime in the shadow of the death camps". Irish Independent . Retrieved 2023-01-09. This novel, this exceptional, layered and compelling story, is built on modern history and all of us people who live it. The protagonist, the elderly, forthright and mysterious Mrs. Fernsby, is more than memorable and every one of Boyne's characters, and every scene, dark or light, is limned in truth and insight. This book moves like a freight train,with force and consequence for the reader. Amy Bloom Further worries manifest themselves: Gretel's other neighbor, Heidi, is becoming increasingly forgetful; and Gretel's cash-strapped, much-married son, Caden, is determined to sell her luxury flat. Boyne does a deep dive into this deeply flawed character. How one can never escape the past; How events shape who we are; How we remain broken until we can reconcile the past with the present; how we can still change who we are from who we were. Even decades later. Not everyone agrees. A 2016 study published by the Centre for Holocaust Education, a British organisation housed at University College London, found that 35 per cent of British teachers used his book in their Holocaust lesson plans, and that 85 per cent of students who had consumed any kind of media related to the Holocaust had either read the book or seen its movie adaptation.

John Boyne is not just one of Ireland's best living novelists but also one of the best novelists of Ireland Sunday Express In 2012, I was awarded the Hennessy Literary ‘Hall of Fame’ Award for my body of work. I’ve also won 4 Irish Book Awards, and many international literary awards, including the Que Leer Award for Novel of the Year in Spain and the Gustav Heinemann Peace Prize in Germany. In 2015, I was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from the University of East Anglia. Kertész bemoaned the way Holocaust art devolves into the dutiful repetition of “certain words”. What are they? Boyne suggests a few contenders. How many times does All the Broken Places refer to the “truth”? Forty-two. Guilt? Thirty-six. Past? Thirty-four. Trauma, horror, and monster get ten uses each. The dialogue is leaden and expository: “My daddy’s not a monster”; “It doesn’t matter any more. It’s all in the past.” The narration is bloated and risible: “He was gone. Louis was gone. Millions were gone”; “I had witnessed too much suffering in my life and done nothing to help. I had to intervene.” She loves her son, but she has all the advantages of a wonderful location plus only a few neighbours.

All the Broken Places

Among my most popular books are The Heart’s Invisible Furies, A Ladder to the Sky and My Brother’s Name is Jessica. My Mayfair residence is listed as a flat but that is a little like describing Windsor Castle as the Queen’s weekend bolthole.” Gretel is a wonderfully complex character, and John Boyne does an incredible job of challenging us to like or dislike Gretel. She is a woman who can show incredible generosity yet show dislikeable traits. Gretel rises to action driven by concern yet can deliver harsh reactions. The remarkable aspect of Gretel’s story is deciding how culpable she was at fifteen to the inhumane compassionless environment of Auschwitz and the gnawing guilt that has been her constant companion for eighty years. “If every man is guilty of all the good he did not do, as Voltaire suggested, then I have spent a lifetime convincing myself that I am innocent of all the bad.” If she was innocent, why was she living under an assumed name? Why had she kept her past hidden from everyone, including her son? John Boyne does a great job in not connecting the dots. He lets readers contemplate their own conclusions: I respect him for it…..

Kurt asks Gretel, “Why do you struggle to call things what they are?” (251) She refuses to say her brother’s name or the name of her former residence in Germany. How do you think this affects the way Gretel processes her emotions? Can you relate? For all the mistakes in her life, for all her complicity in evil, and for all her regrets, I believe that Gretel’s story is also worth telling,” Boyne writes in an author’s note. “It is up to the reader to decide whether it is worth reading.” For this reader, alas, the answer is no. Whether our sympathies lie with Gretel’s first-person account is moot because the characters are too thinly drawn to evoke emotion either way. Other shortcomings include clunky plot devices, implausible dialogue, an unnecessary twist and a preposterous ending. The problem with All the Broken Places is less whether Gretel’s story is worth telling than how it’s told. When a neighbour’s child enters her life, 91 year old Greta has an opportunity for absolution. Or the closest thing to it. She confronts her own dark past and finds the strength and courage to defend someone vulnerable, as she had failed to do for any of those Jews camped outside of her home.

Mother and I escaped Germany in early 1946, only a few months after the war ended, travelling by train from what was left of Berlin to what was left of Paris. Fifteen years old and knowing little of life, I was still coming to terms with the fact that the Axis had been defeated. Father had spoken with such confidence of the genetic superiority of our race and of the Führer’s incomparable skills as a military strategist that victory had always seemed assured. And yet, somehow, we had lost.” His expression was one that I had seen before, when I was a child and living in that other place. The soldiers had worn it, almost to a man. A desire to hurt. An awareness that there was nothing anyone could do to stop them. It was mesmerizing. I could not look away and nor, it seemed, could he.”

But this was really good. I just recently read Boyne's Water, and between that and All the Broken Places it is clear Boyne is keen to explore themes of culpability and complicity. How much are we to blame for the crimes of those close to us? Is one guilty by association? What is our responsibility as a bystander? And can we be forgiven? Gold, Tanya (2022-09-15). "All the Broken Places by John Boyne review: misjudged thriller sequel to The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas". The Daily Telegraph . Retrieved 2023-01-09.

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In this story, Gretel Fernsby is approaching her 92nd birthday when a new family moves into the flat below her. When she befriends the boy and the mother, she is faced with a complexity. She suspects that the husband is abusing, physically and emotionally, both the child and the wife. What to do? If every man is guilty of all the good he did not do, as Voltaire suggested, then I have spent a lifetime convincing myself that I am innocent of all the bad.' The Boy with the Striped Pyjamas

Sequel to the hugely successful The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, All The Broken Places is a moving story about grief, guilt and complicity. Needless to say, that with John Boyne at the helm, we’re treated to a storyline full of insight, from the ugliness of life through to the purity of love. Don’t miss this one! The novel is told in the current time with her interactions between her friends and neighbours. New neighbours play a crucial role in how her present life unfolds. In a separate timeline, Gretel also reflects on the years following the war and the events and course of action her mother took to hide their past – sometimes unsuccessfully. All the Broken Places is the sequel to The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, John Boyne’s bestselling 2006 novel about the Holocaust. You cannot begin to judge the sequel without the prequel, which tells the story of Bruno, the nine-year-old son of a nameless commandant of Auschwitz. Bruno is kindly: he is impervious to Nazism, and he calls the Führer the Fury. He loves exploring – his favourite book is Treasure Island – and, walking the fence between his home and the extermination camp, he meets a Jewish boy called Shmuel who is interned in Auschwitz, which Bruno calls “Out-With”. When Shmuel’s father disappears – he is dead, of course – Bruno offers to help him search. He climbs under the fence, borrows a striped uniform – his hair has already been shaved, due to lice – and is gassed alongside his friend.

When Gretel witnesses a violent argument between Henry’s mother and his domineering father, she is faced with a chance to make amends for her guilt, grief and remorse and act to save a young boy. But by doing this she would be forced to reveal her true identity to the world and could cost her dearly. An eloquent meditation on guilt, complicity and redemption.. a remarkable novel, with humanity at its core Mail on Sunday In Gretel, Boyne has created a magnificently dyspeptic protagonist whose self-assurance, sharp tongue and wry humor are at odds with her private agony.” I was born in Dublin, Ireland, and studied English Literature at Trinity College, Dublin, and Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia, Norwich. In 2015, I was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters by UEA. Her mother was a popular beauty until she became an alcoholic, and Gretel later enjoyed her own privilege of the power people confer on a pretty young woman. She could ask questions and flirt her way through any answers she didn’t want to give.