Reviews for The Lampshade: A Holocaust Detective Story from Buchenwald to New Orleans

The average rating for The Lampshade: A Holocaust Detective Story from Buchenwald to New Orleans based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2011-07-22 00:00:00 Dennis Eslinger "If I were a human skin lampshade who might or might not have been constructed by a doomed Jewish shoemaker at the behest of a mad red-haired woman on a horse, and then found sixty years later by a dope fiend in an abandoned house after the worst storm in in a United States history..." Mark Jacobson is sent this horrific Nazi artifact through the US Postal Service. Much of this book juxtaposes the unthinkable with the mundane. It works. Mark sets out to learn as much as he can about the origins of this lampshade and its authenticity. His journey takes him to New Orleans and Buchenwald, El Paso and Israel. He interviews the expected scholars, historians, and rabbis. But he also interviews the unexpected - David Duke of the KKK, the musician, Aaron Neville, the actress, Dyanne Thorne who played Ilse Koch, "The Bitch of Buchenwald", in the film "She Wolf of the SS". By including some of these colorful people, he thankfully lightens the tone. At one point, Mark journeys to El Paso to interview Albert Rosenberg, an American officer who was there at the liberation of Buchenwald. Rosenberg, now 90, wonders about evil. What is it that allows evil to flourish? He now sees evil at the El Paso-Juarez border. What is it about the convergence of people, geography, opportunity that feeds evil? There are many ethical and moral questions raised in this book. I will be thinking about it for a long time to come.

Review # 2 was written on 2010-11-04 00:00:00 Francis Brenner The Lampshade is not an emotionally easy read. It is the true story of the author's quest to track down the origins of a lampshade created from human skin. The grisly artifact was purchased at a yard sale for a paltry sum; its seller was a drug-addicted pathological liar who apparently stole the lampshade in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Could the hideous object have its origins in Nazi Germany? The author faces the arduous task of learning about the remains and who they may have come from coupled with the overwhelming desire to release the haunting item from his possession (can you blame him?). Along the way he cites especially gruesome examples of man's inhumanity to man throughout history. Much has been said of the author's at-times arduous skipping-around through time and place and back again; he's literally all over the map. On one hand, I could see where this could annoy readers, on the other, I understood his need to frequently reframe the reader's experience. After all, we are reading about a knickknack made out of a human corpse, which very well may be a product of the Holocaust. I doubt Jacobson wants to torment his readers any more than he already does. I'll admit that parts of this book nauseated me. However, I also understand the need for stories like this to be told.