The #4 bestseller of 1961 was another door stopper but mostly a page turner. It is the second version I have read of events concerning the Warsaw ghetto during World War II. I also read John Hersey's The Wall as part of my reading list for 1950. Each book takes a slightly different look at this atrocity but it is hard to say which is better. Because he is Leon Uris, he had to put several love stories in his version, but compared to his 1958 bestseller Exodus this book is so much better in terms of writing style and the characters. He makes clear the evil deeds of Hitler and his henchmen when it came to their treatment of Jews, the ways that they fumbled towards the "final solution," the psychopathic inhumanity of all involved, and the methods used to spin the news about what was happening.In contrast, we see the bravery and humanity of the Jewish leaders as they try to keep as many as possible alive in that ghetto. Mila 18 is the name of the building inside the ghetto where the Jewish resistance had their headquarters.Both this book and The Wall make it clear that the journals and diaries of certain people inside the ghetto are responsible for the knowledge we now have about what happened there. Even as the final residents were being obliterated, some took the steps necessary to keep the journals secure and get the information about their locations into safe hands.To me, that is a story worth telling at least twice. As our continuous wars go on, seemingly always presented as a necessary slaughter of people, whether of another religion or another political system, it is sobering to read about how mankind has forever succumbed to such madness. But it is also steadying to read about the victims who resist, who record, and thus live on.
Uris is a compelling author and has a knack for the historical fiction page-turner. Mila 18 is excellent at capturing the world of the Warsaw Ghetto and really paces the novel well so that you, through the eyes of several characters, see its inexorable decline towards death and destruction. Uris puts a lot of emphasis on the complexities of Jewish society in this period - rather than portraying them all as heroic victims in unified suffering, he goes into the complex intra-social divisions amongst Jews, the tragedy of Jews working against each other in this period, and various ways in which Jewish people tried to ensure their cultural survival. But Mila 18 shares with Uris' other novels some weak characterization and poor writing. Uris really struggles with authentic interactions between characters, especially romantic interactions, and some romantic conversations were so overwrought and cliche I just skipped over them. His characters are very diverse in terms of portrayal, some are nuanced and complex, others feel readily stereotyped and one dimensional. Also there are some departures from the historical record that seem unnecessary. The clearest example of this is the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, which is the climax of the novel but is somewhat revisionist in depicting a month of glorious victories for the Jewish fighters and rank cowardice and incompetence on the part of the Germans. Also some of the historical account of the book shows its age - Uris repeats several urban myths about the war that have long since been debunked. Overall, it's an enjoyable book that gets you into that period and helps you feel the horror and inhumanity of the Warsaw Ghetto, but there's bit a too much Hollywood and stereotyping for my taste.
What do You think about Mila 18 (1983)?
I grew up during World War 11 and although it was kept pretty quite by the Nazis many of us heard about what was happening to the Jewish people in Europe. I read this book when it first came out back in 1961, and I decided to read it again just this past month. This is a really powerful novel, not for the faint hearted. What was so amazing is what these poor Jewish people suffer through. I could hardly put this book down once I started reading it again. I give it five stars. Leon Uris the author also wrote Exodus (movie also with Paul Newman) I plan to re-read Exodus again since it's been over 30 years since I last read it.
—Arlette
I recommend this book. The real events were told through fictitious characters. The book opens with the first salvo of WWII when Germany invaded Poland. The 'sub-human' Jews and other undesirables were rounded up like cattle and herded into the ghettos of Warsaw, Poland. What they did to survive slaughter is the meat of this book. Living in the ghetto meant a life of hunger, thirst, fear and a declining will to live. The ghetto dwellers eventually moved underground where even the healing rays of sunlight were lost to them. As their survival instincts flagged, they held to a singular purpose of getting their story out to the world. Several men wrote daily diaries describing the Jew experience in the Warsaw ghettos. The diaries were hidden in several places known to only a few people. One of those few had to survive to retrieve the diaries. One did survive. So we know the story of how the Jews were persecuted and how they fought and held a Goliath army for over a month using mostly crude instruments of war. However one might feel about the holocaust, those feelings will be changed by this book.Thank you, Mr. Uris, for a good read.(Leon Uris died in 2003.)
—Linda
This book is extremely historically accurate and deals with the greatest tragedy in human history. It does it well, and it is respectful. But it is not a good book. The characters are too flat and boring to really engage with. This problem is magnified by how unfocused the book is. This isn't the tale of a few characters, this is a tale of a small village. It was hard to keep track of who was who at times, mostly because forgettable characters floated in and out of the reader's consciousness. My final quibble: I hate when authors say a character is going to do something and then make the character do it. It feels stilted. At least twice a character said "I shall describe it" and then describes a thing. Imagine what you would think if you read the following passage. Dave felt like he was about to explode with anger, and risked shooting the man before him. Dave said, "I feel as though I am about to explode with anger. I might shoot this man in front of me." Dave exploded with anger and shot the man in front of him. I don't know about you, but I could do without the bonus preaction description of about to do the action.
—travis rigg
