In the Midst of Civilized Europe

Veidlinger's book ranks alongside Timothy Snyder's Bloodlands in forcing our eyes eastwards. It is deeply researched and masterfully written, with a cool restraint that only intensifies its power. --Patrick Bishop, The Telegraph Revelatory . . . Veidlinger's crisp prose and extensive research makes the scale of the tragedy immediate and devastating. This is a vital addition to understanding how the Holocaust happened. --Publishers Weekly Chilling . . . unequivocal . . . A vital history that draws a direct line from Eastern European antisemitic violence to the Holocaust. --Kirkus Reviews (starred) Exhaustive, clearly written, deeply researched. --The Times (UK) The mass killings of Jews in 1918-21 are a bridge between local pogroms and the extermination of the Holocaust. No history of that Jewish catastrophe comes close to the virtuosity of research, clarity of prose, and power of analysis of this extraordinary book. As the horror of events yields to empathetic understanding, the reader is grateful to Veidlinger for reminding us what history can do. --Timothy Snyder, author of Bloodlands A work of singular importance: a meticulous, original and deeply affecting historical account, one that provides new insights into the conditions that catalyzed mass-murder on an industrial scale. --Philippe Sands, author of East West Street In this extraordinary work Veidlinger disinters a largely forgotten history of tragic and portentous dimensions. Compelling and well-written, the book will find a broad audience. This is a story that needs to be told. --Ronald Grigor Suny, author of Stalin: Passage to Revolution In this deeply learned but highly readable book, Veidlinger demonstrates how the all-but-forgotten pogroms in the collapsing Russian Empire in 1918-21 set precedents for the horrors that were to follow just two decades later. --Zvi Gitelman, author of A Century of Ambivalence