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"Poor words, you do not suffice," this is what she wrote in her diary.

“The truth lay in the mass of closely observed detail,�� says this book's editor. “The anonymous diarist possessed an eye so consistent and authentic that even the most imaginative forger would never have been able to reproduce her vision of events.�� Indeed, you sense the authenticity in these words--even if the book really was authenticated. Being alongside the author during her private moments of journaling creates spaces of intimacy that are so informative because they are so closely observed by her. This is a human experience laid bare, an experience that you read about and find difficult to forget:

The day breaks gray and pink. The cold blows through the empty window sockets, filling our mouths with the taste of smoke. Once again the roosters. I have this early hour all to myself. I wipe everything down, sweep away cigarette butts, bread crumbs, fish bones, rub the brandy rings from the tabletop. Then a frugal wash in the tub, with two cups of water. This is my happiest time, between five and seven in the morning, while the widow and Herr Pauli are still asleep—if happy is the right word. It’s a relative happiness. I do some mending and then soap up my extra shirt. We know from experience that no Russians come at this early hour.

I don't want to have you afraid of reading such heavy stuff written with lyrical grace but these words will slice through the page and come at you. It is a necessary read. One that the women's issues woman in me had to tackle. It is not that there is sensationalized or harsh detailing here, for this is beautiful prose written effectively with introspective reasoning. Pity is not grasped for, partly because the author does not even allow herself more than a couple short moments of self-pity. It is fact and experience blending harmoniously and when you think about it, it is so nice to know that such art was being produced during war. The close of war, I should say, because the timeframe here is during the period of Germany’s collapse, when Hitler commits suicide and the Russian army gains control of Berlin.

“It began with silence, ”she writes. I read this line and try to imagine how the noisome brutality that this thirty-four-year-old German and Russian-speaking journalist had to endure, could possibly be accompanied by a silent night and silent morning: “Outside, a bright blue, cloudless sky.�� Yet I’m only left with a few seconds to brood because later, the noise of Russian antiaircraft equipment pierced the German early morning quiet. Jeeps, then boots. Motorcycles. Laughter on once-deserted streets. And then the cracking of windows as Russian soldiers climbed into homes and businesses, demanding what were their spoils of war. Or so they thought.

Poor words, you do not suffice.

Women and pubescent girls, used and abused (the best estimates say more than 100,000 women). But I won't detail these heartrending moments. I will tell you this: “German women were not supposed to talk about the reality of rape; and German men preferred not to be seen as impotent onlookers when the Russians claimed their spoils of war.�� No wonder it took more than five years to find a German publisher for this book that was “quickly relegated to obscurity.��

Yet there is so much more written here. It is about survival and "herd instinct." It is a memoir set apart from others of that era, one that you read and remember. One that you should read, especially since it was practically banned, since the author was chided for even writing about her experience of being subjected to numerous assaults, since she told a friend she didn't want another publisher until after her death.

Poor words, you do not suffice.

A stranger’s hands expertly pulling apart my jaws. Eye to eye. Then with great deliberation he drops a gob of gathered spit into my mouth. I’m numb. Not with disgust, only cold. My spine is frozen: icy, dizzy shivers around the back of my head. I feel myself gliding and falling, down, down, through the pillows and the floorboards. So that’s what it means to sink into the ground.

Once more eye to eye. The stranger’s lips open, yellow teeth, one in front half broken off. The corners of the mouth lift, tiny wrinkles radiate from the corners of his eyes. The man is smiling.