Ten-year-old Felicia Steigman is confused by the sudden disruption to her life when she is expelled from school and forced to wear a yellow star. But she is completely unprepared for what happens next – the forced abandonment of her home and a gruelling journey, overseen by cruel Romanian Nazi collaborators, to Transnistria, a squalid place that doesn’t even exist on a map. Surviving three years surrounded by devastation and death, Felicia’s innocence disappears. When her family’s suffering is silenced and dismissed, Felicia boldly confronts the past, speaking out against injustice and commemorating the forgotten killing fields of Transnistria.

Felicia Carmelly was born in Vatra Dornei, Romania, on September 25, 1931. In 1959, Felicia and her family emigrated from communist Romania to Israel. Three years later they immigrated to Canada, where Felicia earned her master’s degree in social work. Felicia founded Toronto’s Transnistria Survivors’ Association in 1994 and published the anthology Shattered! 50 Years of Silence: History and Voices of the Tragedy in Romania and Transnistria in 1997. Felicia Carmelly lives in Toronto.

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