Bending Toward the Sun
A Mother and Daughter Memoir
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Narrated by:
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Leslie Gilbert-Lurie
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Beata Pozniak
About this listen
A miraculous lesson in courage and recovery, Bending Toward the Sun tells the story of a unique family bond forged in the wake of brutal terror.
Weaving together the voices of three generations of women - Rita, her daughter, Leslie, and her granddaughter, Mikaela - the memoir provides powerful and inspiring evidence of the resilience of the human spirit, relevant to every culture in every corner of the world. Unimaginably devastating and incredibly uplifting, this firsthand account of survival and healing offers a poignant message of hope in our own uncertain times.
Rita Lurie was five years old when she fled her home in Poland to hide from the Nazis. From the summer of 1942 to 1944, she and 14 members of her family shared a nearly silent existence in a cramped, dark attic, subsisting on scraps of food. Young Rita watched helplessly as her young brother and then her mother died by her side. Motherless and stateless, Rita and her surviving family spent the next five years wandering throughout Europe, waiting for a country to accept them.
Decades later, Rita is the matriarch of a close-knit family in California. Yet in addition to love, Rita unknowingly passes to her children feelings of fear, apprehension, and guilt. Her daughter Leslie, an accomplished lawyer, media executive, and philanthropist began probing her mother's childhood to discover how Rita's pain has affected not only Leslie's life and outlook but also that of her children. Their collaboration produced this unforgettable story, which reveals how deeply the Holocaust remains in the hearts and minds of survivors and their descendants.
©2009 Leslie Gilbert-Lurie (P)2021 Leslie Gilbert-LurieListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
“The lasting impact of the Holocaust on a survivor and her daughter emerges in this joint account… The voices and experiences expressed are valuable.” (Publishers Weekly)
“[An] affecting memoir…. Vivid…. Riveting…. An amazing story of wartime survival.” (Kirkus Reviews)
“A captivating memoir that explores a complicated, loving, and enduring mother-daughter bond, and reveals how doubts, hopes, and dreams are handed down from generation to generation. As both a mother and a daughter, I found it deeply touching.” (Arianna Huffington, author, syndicated columnist, and founder of The Huffington Post)
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- By Christine on 07-30-05
By: Debbie Macomber
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The Seven or Eight Deaths of Stella Fortuna
- A Novel
- By: Juliet Grames
- Narrated by: Lisa Flanagan
- Length: 16 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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For Stella Fortuna, death has always been a part of life. Stella’s childhood is full of strange, life-threatening incidents - moments where ordinary situations like cooking eggplant or feeding the pigs inexplicably take lethal turns. Even Stella’s own mother is convinced that her daughter is cursed or haunted. When the Fortunas emigrate to America on the cusp of World War II, Stella and her sister, Tina, must come of age side by side in a hostile new world with strict expectations for each of them.
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Misogyny at its worst
- By brenda on 01-15-20
By: Juliet Grames
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Two Crosses
- Secrets of the Cross, Book 1
- By: Elizabeth Musser
- Narrated by: Kirsten Potter
- Length: 11 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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The glimmering Huguenot cross she so innocently wears leads her deep into the shadows. When Gabriella Madison arrives in the French village of Castelnau in 1961 to continue her university studies, she doesn’t anticipate being drawn into the secretive world behind the Algerian war for independence from France. And the further she delves into the war efforts, the more her faith is challenged. The people who surround her bring a whirlwind of transforming forces.
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Faith, Romance, Spies, and Fascinating History
- By Amazon Customer on 05-02-19
By: Elizabeth Musser
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Before and After
- The Incredible Real-Life Stories of Orphans Who Survived the Tennessee Children's Home Society
- By: Judy Christie, Lisa Wingate
- Narrated by: Emily Rankin
- Length: 7 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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From the 1920s to 1950, Georgia Tann ran a black-market baby business at the Tennessee Children’s Home Society in Memphis. The publication of Lisa Wingate’s novel Before We Were Yours brought new awareness of Tann’s lucrative career in child trafficking. Adoptees who knew little about their pasts gained insight into the startling facts behind their family histories. Encouraged by their contact with Wingate and award-winning journalist Judy Christie, who documented the stories of 15 adoptees in this book, many determined Tann survivors set out to trace their roots.
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Badly written
- By Stacie on 02-25-20
By: Judy Christie, and others
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Christmas Letters
- By: Debbie Macomber
- Narrated by: Renée Raudman
- Length: 4 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Celebrate Christmas on Blossom Street with a brand-new romantic comedy from New York Times best-selling author Debbie Macomber. Katherine O'Connor often spends her days at a cozy cafe on Blossom Street in Seattle where she writes Christmas letters for other people. She's good at making their everyday lives sound more interesting. More humorous. More dramatic. But for Dr. Wynn Jeffries, who also frequents the cafe, Christmas means lies and deception
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"Christmas Letters"
- By shirlfish on 10-08-08
By: Debbie Macomber
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The Ungrateful Refugee
- What Immigrants Never Tell You
- By: Dina Nayeri
- Narrated by: Dina Nayeri
- Length: 10 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Aged eight, Dina Nayeri fled Iran along with her mother and brother and lived in the crumbling shell of an Italian hotel-turned-refugee camp. Eventually, she was granted asylum in America. She settled in Oklahoma, then made her way to Princeton University. In this book, Nayeri weaves together her own vivid story with the stories of other refugees and asylum seekers in recent years, bringing us inside their daily lives and taking us through the different stages of their journeys, from escape to asylum to resettlement.
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Amazing story of resilience and compassion
- By PAH on 09-06-19
By: Dina Nayeri
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The Sum of Our Days
- By: Isabel Allende
- Narrated by: Blair Brown, Isabel Allende
- Length: 11 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Isabel Allende reconstructs the painful reality of her own life in the wake of the tragic death of her daughter, Paula. Narrated with warmth, humor, exceptional candor, and wisdom, this remarkable memoir is as exuberant and as full of life as its creator. Allende bares her soul while sharing her thoughts on love, marriage, motherhood, spirituality and religion, infidelity, addiction, and memory - and recounts stories of the wildly eccentric, strong-minded, and eclectic tribe she gathers around her and lovingly embraces as a new kind of family.
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She does not disappoint
- By ChiChi's Rule on 06-01-22
By: Isabel Allende
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In the Time of Our History
- By: Susanne Pari
- Narrated by: Mozhan Marnò
- Length: 11 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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Twelve months after her younger sister Anahita's death, Mitra Jahani reluctantly returns to her parents' home in suburban New Jersey to observe the Iranian custom of "The One Year." Ana is always in Mitra's heart, though they chose very different paths. While Ana, sweet and dutiful, bowed to their domineering father's demands and married, Mitra rebelled, and was banished.
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Enjoyable
- By J. E. Jordan on 05-23-23
By: Susanne Pari
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upside down
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All history, no romance!
- By Erin on 07-05-13
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Wonderful narration - Story is lacking.
- By Anon54fdgnb7 on 02-05-21
By: Avni Doshi
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Working Stiff
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Just two months before the September 11 terrorist attacks, Dr. Judy Melinek began her training as a New York City forensic pathologist. With her husband and their toddler holding down the home front, Judy threw herself into the fascinating world of death investigation-performing autopsies, investigating death scenes, and counseling grieving relatives. Working Stiff chronicles Judy's two years of training, taking listeners behind the police tape of some of the most harrowing deaths in the Big Apple.
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Great story - but not for the faint of heart!
- By R. Freeman on 08-20-14
By: Judy Melinek MD, and others
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The Two-Family House
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- By: Linda Cohen Loigman
- Narrated by: Barrie Kreinik
- Length: 8 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Brooklyn, 1947: In the midst of a blizzard, in a two-family brownstone, two babies are born minutes apart to two women. They are sisters by marriage, with an impenetrable bond forged before and during that dramatic night; but as the years progress, small cracks start to appear, and their once deep friendship begins to unravel. No one knows why, and no one can stop it. One misguided choice; one moment of tragedy. Heartbreak wars with happiness and almost but not quite wins.
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A Two Family Saga
- By Sara on 08-17-17
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The Lonely Hearts Book Club
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Sloane Parker lives a small, contained life as a librarian in her small, contained town. She never thinks of herself as lonely...but still she looks forward to that time every day when old curmudgeon Arthur McLachlan comes to browse the shelves and cheerfully insult her. Their sparring is such a highlight of Sloane's day that when Arthur doesn't show up one morning, she's instantly concerned. And then another day passes, and another.
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Enjoyed every minute
- By Laura on 06-04-23
By: Lucy Gilmore
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upside down
- By Lisa on 01-28-24
By: Danielle Steel
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Royal Mistress
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All history, no romance!
- By Erin on 07-05-13
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Burnt Sugar
- By: Avni Doshi
- Narrated by: Sneha Mathan
- Length: 8 hrs and 35 mins
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Wonderful narration - Story is lacking.
- By Anon54fdgnb7 on 02-05-21
By: Avni Doshi
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Working Stiff
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- By: Judy Melinek MD, T. J. Mitchell
- Narrated by: Tanya Eby
- Length: 7 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Performance
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Story
Just two months before the September 11 terrorist attacks, Dr. Judy Melinek began her training as a New York City forensic pathologist. With her husband and their toddler holding down the home front, Judy threw herself into the fascinating world of death investigation-performing autopsies, investigating death scenes, and counseling grieving relatives. Working Stiff chronicles Judy's two years of training, taking listeners behind the police tape of some of the most harrowing deaths in the Big Apple.
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Great story - but not for the faint of heart!
- By R. Freeman on 08-20-14
By: Judy Melinek MD, and others
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The Two-Family House
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- By: Linda Cohen Loigman
- Narrated by: Barrie Kreinik
- Length: 8 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Brooklyn, 1947: In the midst of a blizzard, in a two-family brownstone, two babies are born minutes apart to two women. They are sisters by marriage, with an impenetrable bond forged before and during that dramatic night; but as the years progress, small cracks start to appear, and their once deep friendship begins to unravel. No one knows why, and no one can stop it. One misguided choice; one moment of tragedy. Heartbreak wars with happiness and almost but not quite wins.
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What listeners say about Bending Toward the Sun
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Rose
- 03-02-21
Harrowing and heartwarming story
A tale that is harrowing and tragic, yet also inspirational and heartwarming. We hear about Rita’s life from an idyllic early childhood in a small Polish town, through the horrors of escape and hiding out during the Holocaust, and on to a better life in the U.S. Her experiences had long-lasting effects on not just herself but the next generations of her family. It's a story filled with both terrible inhumanity, and great love and kindness, beautifully told.
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1 person found this helpful
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- P. Golum
- 02-16-21
fabulous story - a must listen!
Bending toward the Sun is an amazing audiobook - compelling, fascinating and just a wonderful story. A must listen! Leslie and Rita tell the most amazing story, and it is a heartwarming voyage into the past and present. I loved it. I highly recommend it for everyone, of all generation!
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- Meg B
- 02-18-21
A beautiful tale of mother and daughter
Being in quarantine you often miss the feeling of human connection and Bending Toward The Sun was like a warm hug from an old family friend. The story is still as relevant today as it was 10 years ago. Leslie and Rita told a beautiful story and one I hope people will continue to listen to for years to come!
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- Anonymous User
- 02-16-21
Incredible listen!
I am so glad this book is now available in audio format via Audible! My own mother read the book a year ago, and it's been at the top of my list to read since she recommended it to me; I just haven't had time to read a full book. But now that it's on Audible, I was able to zip through listening- Putting it on 1.4x speed is the equivalent of not being able to put a book down! Everything about this audiobook is great. From Rita's story, which is absolutely incredible and one that everyone should be required to hear, to Leslie's...it's a great reminder that the past doesn't always stay in the past!
And something about the narrator's voice is so soothing to me. Audiobook narration can be hit or miss, but this one definitely hit the mark and then some.
So glad to check this one off my list and will listen to it again (because I can!)
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- Dan S.
- 01-28-21
Fantastic audiobook, highly recommend!!
I often love to listen to an audiobook after reading a book so that I can hear the voices of the characters come to life. Bending Toward the Sun's audiobook did not disappoint! It is a powerful story filled with powerful lessons. Highly recommend this audiobook to anyone who enjoys history and intriguing stories, and to those who recognize the importance of connecting the lessons of the Holocaust to today's world. I hope you enjoy the experience of listening to this audiobook as much as I have.
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- K
- 02-05-21
Very Highly Recommend!
“Bending Toward The Sun” is a fascinating and unique book that not only details the compelling story of Holocaust survivor Rita Lurie but also sheds light on how Rita’s experiences has affected her daughter, Leslie, and granddaughter, Mikaela. Beautifully written, it provides an insightful and intimate portrayal of their lives. A mixture of tragedy, humor, and heart, the book ultimately leaves the reader feeling enlightened and inspired. I especially enjoyed the audiobook since it was special to have author Leslie Gilbert-Lurie share her thoughts and insights in her own voice. I would very highly recommend this book!
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