Henry was one of the 2,011 Jews who weredeported from Cologne, through it all, he found the strength to survive and was one of only 23 to emerge alive from the concentration camps after the war. I was a child during this time and the mere idea of facing what this child faced is beyond comprehend. An controversial opinion but it is my own, I didn’t like this book. I know it’s an autobiography and the things this author went through never should have happened! Let me put that first! This memoir was extremely difficult to listen to with heartbreaking and emotional themes. It was devastating but inspiring hearing Henry’s story of survival, suffering and friendship. Henry was 5 years old when Hitler took power and this memoir follows years of his life through those horrific times and how, against all odds, he survived.

Henry Oster was 5 years old when Hitler took power in 1933, born in Cologne, Germany therefore a German citizen but Henry and his family were also Jewish. Even a German born child wasn't safe from Hitler's wrath and what happens over the next 10 years is a story of resistance, strength and the sheer will to survive with Henry taking the reader from his family home in Cologne to the Lódz Ghetto in Poland before being sent to Auschwitz and then moved in the final months/weeks of the war to Buchenwald before finally being liberated in 1945 and his story after the war and how he overcame the horrendous crimes he witnessed and was subjected too. Henry was one of the 2,011 Jews who were deported from Cologne, through it all, he found the strength to survive and was one of only 23 to emerge alive from the concentration camps after the war. This is the heart-wrenching and inspirational true account of a courageous little German boy who, against all odds, after losing almost everything a human being can lose, survived to tell his story. Henry grew up in Cologne, Germany as an only child. He was barely five years old when Hitler and the Nazis took control of Germany in 1933. As a Jewish boy, his life was about to change drastically. Henry and his family witnessed the unimaginable terrors of Kristallnact. Shortly afterwards, Henry and his parents were ousted from their comfortable apartment and forced to live in one room in a much less desirable location in Cologne. Food became harder and harder to find. Henry’s father started to experience severe depression. He felt hopeless in his role as provider and protector. It wasn’t long before he died from starvation. Although Henry was still young he tried to take care of his mother. It was just the two of them now. Even as a young boy, Henry proved to be brave and resourceful. Then the Nazis relocated Henry and his mother to a ghetto in Łódź, Poland. The conditions were far worse than the conditions in Cologne. At least Henry and his mother were still together and had not been selected for deportation. It feels wrong to give an autobiography about something so horrific 3 stars- it was an overview of the author’s life and experience, and I don’t want to discount that in any way. As a historical recap of events, it was fine. As a piece of literature, it wasn’t great. The book was pretty much the definition of telling rather than showing the audience; while the events described were awful, it almost felt emotionally distant because of the way it was written.Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, Henry Oster and Dexter Ford for providing me with an ARC of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

I was alive. That was about it. I didn’t see very much to thank God about, frankly. If there was anyone to thank for my survival, after all those years of angst and starvation, it was me. Just this little old wise guy, all of sixteen years old, Heinz Adolf Oster.” Henry Oster was just five years old, a wide-eyed boy from the beautiful ancient city of Cologne, Germany, when Adolf Hitler took power in 1933. This was a truly heartbreaking recount of Henry’s days in the Holocaust. However, it was inspiring to hear that after surviving his time in Auschwitz, he moved in with his uncle in America, and then got into optometry school. This story follows a young boy, Henry, who loses everything and goes through the worst possible scenarios a human can go through. Against all odds, he still fights and survives to tell his story.I can say now that was right about this book being an emotional read; I honestly can’t think of another book I have read in recent times that touched my heart as much as this one did. Reading about the horrific situations Henry Oster had to live through as well as the life he went on to live was both heartbreaking and heartwarming and after I finished it I had a nice long cry. Before long, caring for the horses became a passion, and their comfort and strength gave Henry a glimmer of life and hope in an ocean of death. Although with every second that passed, Henry knew if he became too weak or made one mistake, he would be mercilessly replaced....

The stable boy of Auschwitz, while this title is right, only three chapters in this book were about this author working in the stables of Auschwitz. All the other chapters were about this life before, during and after the Second World War. And I understand that because it is an autobiography but it’s really misleading. When Henry describes how he personally felt when he first started to experience hatred against Jews brought me to tears. His description of that day walking home from his first ever day at school, to only be bullied by the Hitler youth and how his life would never be the same from that point on, still gives me the chills to think about.

The horrors of Auschwitz haunt me every time I read about them but I feel it's the least I can endure considering what the real victims of this horrific time had to live through.

Henry tells his story of Hilter’s rise to power and what happened to the Jews during that time. It starts at the beginning and walks through how the Jews went to the ghetto- where he lost his father. Then to the concentration camps- where he lost his mother. I couldn ' t last much longer. But just as I was beginning to give up, I found myself in the Auschwitz stables, with rows of stalls filled with horses." Thank you to the publisher threadbooks and Netgalley for my arc of this one to read prior to it's release date on 04/04/2023 I did plan to keep this one to read closer to release date but, I was desperate to read it.

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This book was extremely well written, very descriptive, informative and heartbreaking honest. Henry is one of those people that I know from reading this book if I were to meet him I would be instantly drawn to him, his story is remarkable and how he survived is incredible. It’s hard to frighten a boy after he’s faced starvation, disease, brutality and, in my case, a machine-gun firing squad. We were the strong ones, the ones who had survived.” The first three chapters are primarily about the history of the Jewish people and how Adolf Hitler came to be in power. The next fifty-four are an account of Henry’s horrific story, how he coped and how he endured and survived the Holocaust. Told from a very personal viewpoint, The Stable Boy of Auschwitz is just one man’s account. Never forget that, sadly, there were hundreds of thousands more like Henry. From risking his life hiding scraps of food in the stables to sustain himself, to escaping selections for the gas chambers, a firing squad and a death march through the brutal Polish winter, Henry somehow found the strength to keep going. Absolutely everything about this book pulled me in: the eye-catching cover, the compelling origins of the story, and the beautiful prose which carried the heartbreaking reality.