Lucette Lagnado Boeken

Exploring themes of exile and assimilation, the narrative intertwines the coming-of-age stories of Lagnado's mother, Edith, in the enchanting old Cairo, and Lagnado's own experiences as an immigrant schoolgirl in 1970s Brooklyn. As she navigates the challenges of adapting to a new culture while aspiring to be a bold figure like Mrs. Emma Peel from The Avengers, Lagnado also recounts her journey as a determined reporter. This poignant memoir reflects on feminism and the deep connections within family amidst the backdrop of cultural displacement.

Lagnado re-creates the cosmopolitan glamour of Cairo in the years between World War II and Nasser's rise to power. Her father, Leon, was a boulevardier who conducted business in his signature white sharkskin suit on the elegant terrace of Shepheard's Hotel, and later, in the cozy, dark bar of the Nile Hilton. But with the fall of King Farouk, Leon and his family lose everything. As streets are renamed, neighborhoods of their fellow Jews disbanded, and the city purged of foreign influence, the Lagnados, too, must make their escape. With all of their belongings packed into 26 suitcases, their jewels and gold coins hidden in sealed tins of marmalade, Leon and his family depart for any land that will take them. The poverty and hardships they encounter in their flight from Cairo to Paris to New York are strikingly juxtaposed against the beauty and comforts of the lives they left behind.--From publisher description.

During World War II, Nazi doctor Josef Mengele subjected some 3,000 twins to medical experiments of unspeakable horror; only 160 survived. In this remarkable narrative, the life of Auschwitz's Angel of Death is told in counterpoint to the lives of the survivors, who until now have kept silent about their heinous death-camp ordeals.