Captive Child
From Communist Cruelty, to Rebirth in Jerusalem

A most unlikely hero. A most unconventional memoir.

Shepsel was a little Jewish boy cared for in a nurturing German home - until his Nazi "father" was killed fighting for the Third Reich and his foster mother handed him over to a death camp. (She gave him a stuffed bunny rabbit in parting.) After World War II he spent years behind the walls of a brutal Stalinist orphanage. Miraculously united with his Jewish family, they had to hide from him, their eldest son, the secret of their Torah observance, lest he inform on them to the Communist authorities. Product of a ruthless and cruel upbringing, Shepsel was defiant and occasionally even violent; years later, a successful doctor, he remained a staunch atheist.

And yet.. and yet..

Captive Child is the unbelievable true story of a man who, against all odds, slowly turns his life around and finds the God of his fathers. Written by his long-lost cousin Carmela Raiz -- whose own fascinating story was told in her bestselling memoir Blue Star Over Red Square. Captive Child is a story of adventure, redemption, and hope, and, above all, the power of Jewish survival.

By Carmela Raiz