The Boy on the Wooden Box Audiobook

Even in the darkest of times—especially in the darkest of times—there is room for strength and bravery. This remarkable memoir from Leon Leyson, one of the youngest children on Oskar Schindler's list to survive the Holocaust, is evidence of that.

Leon Leyson (born Leib Lezjon) was only ten years old when the Nazis invaded Poland and his family was forced to relocate to the Krak├│w ghetto. With incredible luck, perseverance, and grit, Leyson was able to survive the sadism of the Nazis, including that of the demonic Amon Goeth, commandant of Plaszow, the concentration camp outside Krak├│w. Ultimately it was the generosity and cunning of one man—Oskar Schindler—that saved Leon Leyson's life and the lives of his mother, his father, and two of his four siblings. Schindler added their names to his list of workers in his factory—a list that became renowned throughout the world: Schindler's List.

This, the only memoir published by a former Schindler's List child, perfectly captures the innocence of a small boy who goes through the unthinkable. Most notable is the lack of rancor, the lack of venom, and the abundance of dignity in Mr. Leyson's telling. The Boy on the Wooden Box is a legacy of hope, a memoir unlike anything you've ever read.

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“Leyson and hiscoauthors give this wrenching memoir some literary styling, but the book is atits most powerful when Leyson relays the events in a straightforward manner, asif in a deposition, from the shock of seeing his once-proud father shamed byanti-Semitism to the deprivation that defined his youth. Schindler remains akindly but enigmatic figure in Leyson’s retelling, occasionally doting butusually distant. Leyson makes it clear that being ‘Schindler Jews’ offered athread of hope, but it never shielded them from the chaos and evil thatsurrounded them. Readers will close the book feeling that they have made agenuinely personal connection to this remarkable man.”

— Publishers Weekly (starred review)