This book takes the reader through a history of a family that must surely be echoed in many others if only the old papers could be located and deciphered. Nick has written this in a lively style, with lots of anecdotes. It is of particular interest to those of us with Jewish forebears. The story concentrates on just a few people but the thread is drawn through them and down to today. Almost as an addendum, Nick talks about her own (actually quite fortunate) experiences during the Nazi time, and this too brings a relevance to the older less well known past.