An autobiography of a World War II concentration camp survivor, written with the help of friends. Corrie ten Boom of Haarlem, the Netherlands, and her family provided sanctuary for dozens of Dutch Jews during the Nazi occupation. They were betrayed, arrested, and imprisoned. Corrie's father and sister, and other family members, died in the camps, but Corrie lived to tell, and to witness to God's amazing love and the strength given her to get through. The title of the book refers not only to the Secret Room in the ten Boom home, but also to Jesus Christ, who gives us peace in our hearts in all circumstances. She was a missionary for Jesus Christ until well into her eighties.

I read this book about 30 years ago, and ordered it to read again and send on to a friend. It is a new paperback.

I have finished reading it, and will soon be sending it on to another Bookcrosser. There are parts of it that I didn't remember from years ago when I read it, and parts that I understand better now, since my own faith has grown in thirty years.

There is a section of photographs near the center. They were shots taken from the movie produced by the Billy Graham Association.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kssN4mqiE5w

In 2001, my husband and I visited Haarlem, the Netherlands, and toured the ten Boom home and watch shop. (They still sell watches and clocks, but they no longer make them there. I bought a Delft blue miniature grandfather-style clock.) We went up the narrow stairs to the Secret Room, where six people, Jews and resistance workers, survived the search and subsequent guarding of the house, and were later sent to safer quarters. The house looks exactly as described in the book and shown in the movie (it must have been filmed there).

We stayed on the Grote Markt (at the Hotel Amadeus), and toured St. Bavo's Cathedral, both mentioned in the book, so I could picture as I read how it must have been for the ten Boom family.

Corrie ten Boom has written other books, too, including In My Father's House, telling of her early years before the war, and Tramp for the Lord, telling of her work giving talks and raising money for the homes she founded for WWII survivors in the Netherlands and in Germany.

CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:

Sending to a Bookcrosser in Arizona.

Found this one in my mailbox yesterday. I know this one will be hard to read, but I will. I lived, as practically the only Gentile, in a Jewish neighborhood until I was nine. I am old enough to remember that for so many of the adults, WWII was very fresh in their minds. One Russian woman had a concentration camp tatoo on her arm. She never spoke about it.
I will never understand religious persecution. Will journal this book again once it has been read and absorbed.
Thank you fancyhorse.

I finished this remarkable book a couple of days ago, but needed time to process before journalling. Had I found this book in a book store and read the back cover, I probably wouldn't have picked it up because of the description of its Christianity-biased content. However, lately life has been filled with loss -- untimely deaths, friends moving away -- and when I perused my bookshelf for something to read, this little book sort of jumped into my hands. It is filled with wisdom and truth and strength, and even if it doesn't make me into a believer ( :) ), much of what I absorbed will become part of who I am.

The story of the Dutch tenBoom family, specifically Corrie and her sister Betsie, is a testament to true, unselfish love and Christian kindness. They opened their hearts and their home during the Nazi occupation of Holland, putting their trust in God, believing that he would guide them. Their unwavering faith in God and in his having a plan for the world, and their courage in the face of the Nazi occupation and their eventual incarceration, both in a wretched prison and a filthy concentration camp, is awe-inspiring.

Their story is not only a testament to faith, but it is a brilliantly told historical biography. The vivid descriptions of the horrors of living through the Nazi occupation of their country, the conditions in the prisons and camps, the detached cruelty of their captors, should be on every high school's reading list (independent of religious content and slant). The wisdom in this book -- how to deal with loss, believing that you will be given the spiritual tools you need just when you need them; how to honestly 'love thine enemies'.... it's quite amazing. I have marked several pages and will be going back to each one of them to re-read and re-think.

If, in today's crazed society, we were seeing Christians behaving as the tenBooms, if we were exposed to this type of Christian compassion and love, the churches would be overflowing. Instead we see religion used as an excuse to be hateful, closed-minded, bigoted.... Maybe this book should be required reading in every Sunday school and church meeting across the nation... We might actually be on to something here :)

Thanks to fancyhorse for passing this one along to me. I have a couple of other readers in mind, but I think I'll hang on to it for awhile before I let it go.

Passed this one along to a friend who just lost her partner. I think there's much wisdom in this little book. I hope she will find it meaningful.