I could feel the characters fear and anxiety during the Nazi occupation of their Polish homeland in the first chapters. I was reluctant to keep reading...it was disturbing. When the scene moved to modern day America I was intrigued. O.K. where is this going? The plot moves back and forth between the hell of survival during the holocaust and survivors modern American family's difficulties. The aged survivor makes a request of the harried modern granddaughter to complete a mission to Poland that will set straight the family history.