A Jew in the Woods

• Author: Berl Kagan
• Genre: Memoir
• Publication Date: August 18, 2026
• Publisher: White Goat Press

Thank you to NetGalley and White Goat Press for providing me with an ARC of this ebook in exchange for an honest review.

“Life goes on even when you hear the sound of death’s wings fluttering over you every minute of the day and night.”

Of the 35,000 Lithuanian Jews trapped by the Nazis in the Kovno Ghetto, most did not survive Hitler’s reign. Berl Kagan, a 34-year-old journalist and political activist, was among the few who escaped the ghetto before it was liquidated. Yet this bid for freedom was only the first step in a protracted quest to cheat almost-certain death. With his wife and sister-in-law, Kagan spent nine months in the forest, facing near-starvation, freezing temperatures, and the ever-present threat of capture and murder. The Red Army was advancing—but how many miracles would it take to see the day of liberation?

Over the course of those dark, intrepid months, Kagan somehow kept a journal, recording his day-to-day life with unflinching lucidity and eloquence. The experience of Jews who, during the Holocaust, fled to the woods of Eastern Europe is little documented—here, we have an electrifying real-time account of, in the author’s words, “one long, horror filled drama.” Heart-stoppingly riveting and ashimmer with moral beauty and hope, A Jew in the Woods is an astonishing testament to the resilience of the human spirit.

Introduction by Rebecca Frankel, author of Into the Forest: A Holocaust Story of Survival, Triumph, and Love, a 2021 National Jewish Book Award finalist.

Although I do not enjoy reading memoirs of Holocaust survivors, I make sure to do so whenever I can. I am the daughter of a Holocaust survivor from Poland who spent the majority of the Holocaust in hiding, so my father instilled a strong urge to bear witness. To me, that means reading nonfiction accounts written by survivors and continuing to carry the message that my father spent his life sharing.

I have read countless memoirs and nonfiction books about the Holocaust, but each survivor has a unique story, especially those who were in hiding. This book caught my attention, and I was fascinated by the fact of a Jew in hiding during the Holocaust keeping a diary that survived. While my father and his immediate family survived in Poland, where 90% of the country’s Jews were murdered, I was curious to learn more about what it was like in Lithuania. Between 90% and 95% of Lithuania’s Jews were murdered in the Holocaust, and before the war there was a thriving Jewish community and it had been known as a major Jewish religious and cultural center since the 18th century. 

This book was translated from the original Yiddish (A Yid in Vald) by Max Rosenfeld, and has an epilogue written by his daughter. It took me nearly a month to read this short read (149 pages), while reading lighter reads concurrently, mainly because it hit really close to home. Kagan’s story of survival had a lot of similarities to that of my own family. 

The writing is simple and straightforward but it is also raw and uncensored. It makes it both easy to read yet emotionally difficult. Kagan doesn’t make attempts to sanitize the horrors of the Holocaust at any point—he openly shares about the misery of being infested with lice, freezing cold, unable to bathe, starving, and always with the threat of death hanging over their heads. Every day there were decisions to make: should we stay in the ghetto or try to escape? If we escape, where can we go? Even while in hiding, they constantly had to worry about being caught, being given up by a neighbor, and above all, their lives were ruled by fear.

“My own opinion was that it would be better to get out of the ghetto ten months too early than ten minutes too late.”

Kagan shares what life in the ghetto was like living with the threat of liquidation over their heads. He spends time considering when to make his escape, along with his wife and his sister-in-law. The odds weren’t good for Jews in Lithuania no matter what—the Nazis were hunting Jews, the Lithuanian partisans in the forest that fought against the Germans often held equally antisemitic views so trying to join them might result in being shot.

There are so many passages in the book that really hit me in the feels, and it wasn’t just because of the similarities between the Kagans and my own family (who spent 27 months hiding in a tiny attic loft in a barn with 6 other people). This is a raw, uncensored, and highly emotional book, and even I found it hard to sit and read for long periods of time, so I made sure to squeeze in a chapter or two each day. He openly shares about feeling stuck, “lying in a living grave,” while life goes on for the Gentiles. My father also would share about being covered in lice, but it seemed like they focused on the smaller irritants to not have to think about death hanging over them at all times. This quote really hit me hard:

“If we ever get out of this alive, we will probably wonder how we managed to endure such a hail of close calls, such a long series of emotional shocks, without our hearts bursting into pieces.”

Lithuania was a center of Jewish religious life and Torah study was widespread, so it isn’t surprising that Kagan leans heavily into his faith and spirituality. He leans on his vast memories of Biblical study and parables to get through this ordeal, even not knowing whether he would survive or not. This didn’t surprise me at all, especially after seeing this occur in my own lifetime—when the hostages returned from Gaza, so many of them reported becoming more spiritual and religious to get through their ordeal.

Besides the cramped and dangerous situations when a pair of Lithuanian peasants open their barn to a group of Jews, they also had to worry about being able to pay for food and lodging, the internal squabbles that inevitably occur with a group of people living in close quarters for a long period of time, and most of all, being discovered and killed. They lived in constant fear and Kagan describes it as: 

“Every rustle, every crackle of a twig, every bark of a dog, every sound of a passing wagon—everything gives birth to a thought: They’re after me. They will catch me. They are leading me—to death.”

One thing I have noticed about fictional Holocaust stories, even those based on a true story, is that they often end in a positive way. However, that wasn’t how it typically was for most Jews. I often hear (and say) that two things can be true at the same time, and that’s never clearer than in this book. Kagan expresses happiness over his survival of the Holocaust, but tempers that joy with all of the pain that arises from realizing that yes, you lived but have nowhere to go and often no one to celebrate survival with. Entire families were wiped out across Nazi-occupied Europe, but in countries like Poland and Lithuania nearly all of the Jewish population was wiped out. Discovering that your home is gone, your family is gone, your resources are gone, and all you have is your life and if you’re especially lucky, a few family members that also survived. It also takes him time to readjust to living without having to always worry about someone seeing or hearing you, and that also echoes experiences of hostages kept in Gaza:

“The fear of the people who have dominated us does not vanish immediately. We still walk unsteadily. We still speak in whispers. We still hesitate to utter a Yiddish word aloud. And if anyone does raise his voice, we still warn him, ‘Sh-sh! Not so loud!’”

Overall, this was a raw, emotional, and deeply distressing read, but also so important. Part of the distress might be because it did echo experiences that my own family had, but I do feel strongly that a book like this is a vital and enlightening addition to Holocaust nonfiction. Each story of a Jew in hiding is different from another, and this book offers an eyewitness account of the ways Lithuanian Jews made use of the forests to hide. It adds to the historical record, and for that alone, this was valuable reading for me even if it wasn’t an easy read. I loved that it showed the long-standing tradition of both joy and pain that was always present for so many generations of Jews—even those who survived struggled to celebrate their freedom and survival when there were so many other major losses, including homes, families, finances, and entire communities. While this was not an easy read, it is worthwhile.

Bottom line: An incredible memoir of a Lithuanian man who survives the Holocaust by hiding out, it is also highly emotional and doesn’t sanitize the horrors of Jews living in hiding during Nazi occupation. Just be warned: it is grim and can be distressing, and the ending is bittersweet.

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