The Incredible True WWII Story of Soulmates Stranded An Ocean Apart
Learn about history through the lens of this inspirational, award-winning account that serves as a powerful reminder of the resilience of the human spirit.
About the Book
Before World War II, Abe and Sonia Huberman were two soulmates happily married and in love, living a peaceful life with their family in Warsaw, Poland. But while Abe was away, on a short business trip to America, World War II broke out and the Nazis invaded. Abe was stranded far from home, while Sonia was left alone with their two young children to face the Nazis. This is the story of her bravery, of Sonia’s survival of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising and Nazi death camps, including the notorious Auschwitz. What was supposed to be a separation of seven weeks turned into one of seven years.
This is the story of their love, of soulmates reunited against all odds. Learn about history through the lens of this inspirational account that serves as a powerful reminder of the resilience of the human spirit.
New Edition including Index
Separated Together: The Incredible True WWII Story Of Soulmates Stranded An Ocean Apart by Kenneth P. Price, PH.D. is a poignant memoir that chronicles the dramatic lives of Sonia and Abe during WWII, their adversities and hardships. The memoir looks at the intricacies and complexities of human relationships and throws light on how they survived the Holocaust and rebuilt their lives. The story is about how WWII breaks out when Abe was on a trip to America and Sonia was in Poland with their two children and had to deal with the Nazis. Theirs is a story of love, hope, resilience, strength, courage, and perseverance, and readers will be impressed by the way they made their life happen against all odds.
The story of Abe and Sonia is engaging and fascinating and sheds light on how they survived the challenges thrown at them despite being on separate continents and dealing with problems alone. Readers will find Abe and Sonia relatable as the author describes them and their personalities in detail, along with how their love story progressed. The memoir also throws light on the atrocities committed by Hitler on the Jews, planning the German attack on Poland, plans to extend Germany's borders and rule Poland, and how the war and the Holocaust affected all of them. The memoir is a fine blend of romance and history as it gives readers glimpses of WWII and the wonderful love story of Abe and Sonia where they survived being separated due to the war and how they managed to rebuild their lives.
– Mamta Madhavan
Dr. Ken Price has produced an unique and interesting book here to honor his in-laws from WWII. Rarely do you hear about a son-in-law praising his in-laws, especially his mother-in-law. However, Dr. Price not only praises his in-laws, he also reveres and honors them by writing their story of survival. Few sons-in-laws would dedicate six years to writing and researching the story of their in-laws, but Dr. Price does so and shows brilliantly how these two people illustrate how to live a healthy life. His father-in-law, Abe Huberman, was a refugee to American in 1939 when war broke out in his home country in Poland. He stayed in the U.S. and built up a life from nothing and waited patiently for the war to end so he could be reunited with his beloved wife. Dr. Price's mother-in-law, Sonia Huberman, was stuck in Warsaw when war broke out with Abe's and her two small children. Sonia suffered in the ghetto in Warsaw and then was deported to Majdanek and Auschwitz. Her children were killed in the camps, but she survived the war, in part, by knowing her husband was waiting for her. After 1945, she made her way back to her husband and she and Abe built a life together in the United States and had two additional children. Dr. Price is most insightful when he takes the therapeutic training and psychological insights he has gained over a lifetime of work, especially having worked with U.S. veterans and their trauma for years, when reviewing the lives of his in-laws in order to teach us the lessons of how one lives a good life despite hardships. This story is about hope, love and survival and is told well by Dr. Price. It shows us in dramatic form what superhuman feats we are capable of if we have a will and desire to do them."
– Bryan Mark Rigg, author of Hitler's Jewish Soldiers and The Rabbi Saved by Hitler's Soldiers
Separated Together is so much more than the everyday garden variety Holocaust story. I know so many personal journeys of Holocaust survivors have hit the bookstores, but I think this book is special. I love the style, the attention to detail and tying in historical, Biblical and literary references. I am caught up, breathlessly agonizing as Sonia makes an escape from the Warsaw Ghetto and by returning to it saves her life. I love Abe’s aphorism about Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow and how he chooses to live in Today.
Memory, faith and longing over time and space sustained both Abe and Sonia through adversity and hardship, becoming in the end, a uniquely American epic. For those who wonder, how did WWII and the Holocaust come about, the author offers a clear historical background to explain what led to the World War, targeting of the Jews, and Germany's quest for land and power. After reading this book, one can no longer say, “I had no idea, I didn't know.” Prepare to be woke.
– Jackie Wald, Book Reader, Editor and Reviewer
As a Holocaust scholar, author, researcher, filmmaker, I have read many Holocaust memoirs and conducted hundreds of survivor interviews. And although each one is unique and each one has resonance, this story told by Ken Price of his parents-in-law is unique beyond unique! It is not only a Holocaust story, it is also – to borrow Dickens’ title – a ‘Tale of Two Cities!’ Where else have you heard of one spouse in Poland, while the other is at New York’s 1939 World’s Fair? Where else have you read about a Jew volunteering to go to Auschwitz? Or a woman, whose children were murdered, actually saying, “I have ONLY met good people in my life”? The story of Sonia and Abe is, to be sure, a tragic story – How can it be anything but tragic when your children are murdered? – but it is also a story of triumph, of remarkable resilience, and at its heart, a story of love. Besides being a gripping, personal account of Sonia’s endurance and survival during the war coupled with her husband’s struggling immigrant life in the United States, this story continues long after the war is over. We see the re-creation of a family, as Sonia and Abe reunite in 1946. They not only begin a new life in their new country, they find joy again as well. They have a second little girl and boy; they become proud and loving parents, and grandparents, and throughout the thread of the ‘new’ family that they create, their love for the ‘old’ family is never far from anyone’s memory. This is a story of love and resilience, and ultimately, of hope. It is a story that must be [told] – so that others may learn and hope as well.”
– Ann Weiss, author of The Last Album: Eyes from the Ashes of Auschwitz-Birkenau, Norton: 2001
Thank you very much for sending me a copy of your manuscript. It gives me great pleasure to offer a brief review of your book Separated Together.
I am also a child of immigrants. My father was born near Krakow, Poland. He moved to Vienna in his teens and escaped with my mother from Austria in 1939, managing to reach the U.S.
Your narrative is a story of resilience, first and foremost, of a family that found each other after unspeakable loss and separations who managed to put losses behind them and live a most productive and meaningful life. For other survivors, including my father, the adaptation did not turn out so well, although the next generation – my generation – has fared much better.
You are a masterful storyteller and historian, weaving within the story of Abe and Sonia, the history of the Nazi’s and their systematic annihilation of the Jews. As a psychologist, you show remarkable sensitivity and insight into your protagonists and other trauma survivors, the situations they faced and how they survived without major psychological damage.
The stories are compelling. The characters brought to life; the reunion and “second life” inspirational.
This book is a wonderful addition to the library of Holocaust memoirs. I can see this book turned into a moving and successful screenplay and movie.
–
Ron Fischler, M.D. FAAP Pediatrician, Associate Clinical Professor of Pediatrics, University of Arizona College of Medicine, Phoenix, AZ
What a great achievement you have accomplished with your magnum opus. It’s an admirable and complex work merging history, emotion, social science, and love. You accomplish the tremendous achievement of synthesizing the histories, personalities and characters of Abe and Sonia while presenting the dramatic story of their lives. The prose is clear and the narrative flows. The format is excellent – following the parallel lives of Abe and Sonia from childhood, through courtship and marriage, through their wartime separation, their moving reunion, and afterwards as survivors.
There is an erudite interweaving of historical chapters on history of 20th century, Poland in 20th century, rise of Nazism, political events of 1930s, the Final Solution, and politics in the West – a great introduction for history students.
You have a nice way of injecting your own voice into the narrative, including touches of humor, bringing the reader closer to the story. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to read your work, at once popular and scholarly, and to revisit the extraordinary lives of Sonia and Abe.
– Helen Schary Motro attorney and author of Maneuvering Between the Headlines, 2005; daughter of Zalman Schary, the cousin who persuaded Abe to come to America in August 1939 for a “short visit.” She divides her time between Tel Aviv and New York
This moving memoir describes the lives of a Jewish couple married before the war but divided during the Nazi occupation of Poland as the husband had found himself in the US at the outbreak of the war. Miraculously, his wife survived and they were reunited in 1946 and made new lives for themselves in the United States. It is a remarkable study of human resilience and should be read by all those interested in the fate of the Jews in the tragic twentieth century.
– Antony Polonsky, Albert Abramson Professor (Emeritus) of Holocaust Studies at Brandeis University, Chief Historian, Museum of Polish Jews in Warsaw
Just finally finished your book and WOW!!! Terrific work, it knocked me out, told me much I didn't know historically which was the greatest pleasure for me, lots of fascinating historical stuff and such a truly wonderful tribute to Gloria and family.
Very, very impressed and really knocked out by it all. Kind of wiped me out in the best way possible. Congratulations on a wonderful accomplishment, really well done!
– Henry Jaglom, writer, film and stage director & producer, author of The Third Stone on the Second Row: A Family Memoir and a Brief History of the Jewish People; son of Simon Jaglom, Director of trade in Danzig pre-1939
I’m sure this is a labor of love, it shows. This is a compelling personal story whose intimate look at the human costs and triumphs of the transitions of history tells the story of people losing a world and finding a new one. Beyond a story of the Holocaust, it explores the way that people lived and the way that they rebuilt their lives.
– Daniel Greenfield, Shillman Fellow at David Horowitz Freedom Center
Ken Price, a creative and scholarly clinical psychologist, has produced an uncommonly thoughtful chronicle of two people’s debasement by but ultimate victory over murderous Nazi oppression. It’s a true story that reads like a novel. It’s inspiring as well as sobering – inspiring because it shows what the human spirit can overcome; sobering because it is a cautionary tale of what the Jews have been subjected to for thousands of years and of what, like other oppressed groups, they are at risk for today and into the future. This beautifully written book is uplifting even as it is frightening. Price has written something notable.
– Gerald C. Davison, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles
'Separated Together' is a powerful work about survival and renewal whose narrative spans generations and is sure to inspire new generations in the 21st century who need to learn the bitter and inspiring lessons of the Shoah.
– Rabbi Abraham Cooper, Simon Wiesenthal Center, Los Angeles
Kenneth Price's book, 'Separated Together', is a great accomplishment in the realm of Holocaust chronicles. It gives a deep insight into the enmity against the Jews as well as their brutal mass murder, their suffering, their humiliation, and their deepest despair. Yet it also reflects their attempts at survival and the survivors’ search for a new existence after the war. This is an important book in the world of the Literature of the Holocaust.
– Dr. Zsuzsanna Ozsvath, Ackerman Center for Holocaust Studies, Leah and Paul Lewis Chair in Holocaust Studies Professor Emeritus, The University of Texas at Dallas, Author of When the Danube Ran Red (2010) and My Journey Home: Life after the Holocaust (2019)
Dr. Kenneth Price’s book Separated Together is not only the story of a miraculous reunion, but this testimony itself has something of the miraculous about it. September 1939: Sonia’s husband Abe was stranded in New York, while she and her two children were left in Poland, to be swept up in the horrific whirlwind that was the Holocaust. Somehow Sonia was resurrected from the ashen earth of Auschwitz. Somehow she was able to embrace her husband Abe once more. Somehow the two of them made a new life in America – but without their murdered children. Dr. Price relates this powerful tale with insight and eloquence, in all of its pathos and drama. It is sure to transform you.
– Dr. David Patterson, Hillel A. Feinberg Distinguished Chair in Holocaust Studies, Ackerman Center for Holocaust Studies, University of Texas at Dallas
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