Author(s): Rachelle Unreich

Australian Biography

As her mother, Mira, nears the end of her life, journalist Rachelle Unreich wants to find out more about how Mira survived four concentration camps, including Auschwitz. There was a mystery to her survival, it seemed - which perhaps had something to do with the strange things that always happened around her. Incredibly, when she gave testimony about the Holocaust decades later, Mira said that it was during this time that she learned about 'the goodness of people'. Born in Czechoslovakia, Mira Blumenstock was twelve years old when World War II broke out. She would live a full life in Paris and Australia. Then, at eighty-eight, she was diagnosed with terminal cancer. Rachelle interviewed Mira to distract her from her illness, and what she discovered about her mother was breathtaking. Not only did Rachelle begin to understand Mira's past, but she was able to fit together the jigsaw puzzle pieces of her own life. A story of love, loss, wonder and the deepest kind of faith, A Brilliant Life questions the role of fate and chance, and reveals an unbreakable connection between mother and child. It will capture hearts, spark important conversations and show us that one small act of kindness can, quite literally, save a life.