Badenheim 1939 Author:Aharon Appelfeld, Dalya Bilu (Translator) This haunting novel begins as a group of Jewish vacationers arrive in Badenheim, a resort town near Vienna. Expecting their usual pleasant summer interlude despite the rumors of approaching war, they cling with desperation to normality, even as the Nazis close in and, finally, turn the resort into a prison. Aharon Appelfeld's first novel is ... more »the beginning of his lifelong exploration of the effects of the Holocaust on average Jewish families, and of the grim and inexorable advance of darkness in a world that was once full of light. Translation of: Badenhaim, Ê»ir nofesh.« less