This book tells the story of Olek, a young Jewish man, his fiance, and her mother and brother. It focuses on the Ponary Massacre, where thousands of Jews were shot and dumped into pits . This took place well before the concentration camps.
The story is told from several points of view. It's fiction based on real events from history. While I found the subject matter compelling, the writing seemed jerky, and I never felt like I got to know any of the characters in depth. This was an average read for me.

Thanks to NetGalley for providing me with an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an unbiased review.

I can’t say that I enjoyed this book because of the horrific events it chronicled, but I had a hard time putting it down. While there is an abundance of novels set during WWII this is the first I’ve read about Ponary and the horrors that took place there, about the prisoner camps in Siberia and the general plight of the Lithuanian Jews at the hands of their own countryman as well as the Nazis and Soviets. The book was meticulously researched with extensive author and source notes. You will cry, you will be horrified throughout but will in the end be filled with hope. Highly recommended 5+ stars.

This story was very informative but heartbreaking. Although the story brought me to tears many times, it was also inspirational and uplifting towards the end. The author's way of explaining what was happening to various characters and their plight, along with weaving truths into the historical details, was done amazingly well.

I learned a lot about the history of the Lithuanians and their experiences during the war. Things surprised me, and I felt my heart ache for them. It still baffles me at the lengths some of humanity will go for greed, power, and control over other people.

The characters in the story had many layers, endured hardships and loss, but some of them, with remarkable determination, faith, and the ability to be a step ahead of the enemy, made it through to freedom. I was surprised at what seemed to be a set of miracles at the end, producing a happy ending. Hope was still alive.

I received a complimentary copy from NetGalley; a positive review is not required. All opinions are my own.

A very hard book to read -- not for how it was written, but for the content. I knew nothing about how the Baltic states were affected by WWII, the Nazi invasion or the antisemitism of the time. The line in the movie " a person is smart, but people are stupid" is so apt and came into play here. If the Nazis were blaming the Jews for everything, there must've been something to it, right?!? To read about people being marched into camps, lined up to be shot, not everyone falling dead but playing it in the hopes of somehow surviving to escape, those next in line being forced to bury those who came minutes prior before taking their turns in the shooting gallery. And I'd know the Siberian camps were bad, but to force them men to go off to fish for months before shelters had,been built, leaving the women and children to handle it and fast as the polar night was coming on quickly. Man's inhumanity to man. No, this book was not an easy read, but such a necessary one in light of what is currently happening in this country. "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it," said George Santayana, and we are living it now.

An engrossing book and so well written and researched. Very enlightening on the participation of .lithuania. A must read for anyone interested in the holocaust.

From Malice to Ashes
Forest of No Mercy
by Gary W. Toyn

Anybody that has read Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys, will love this book as it highlights the struggles that the Balkan states endured first under the Soviet Union and second under Nazi Rule. I was quite surprised by this book as it informed me of things that I did not know about, regarding what happened to these countries before, during and after War World II. That is a feat in itself as I have read mostly WWII books for the past 10 years. I continue to be amazed at how cruel the world can be during times of war and how the people affected endured such atrocities. Starving for the most part, sick, cold, exposed to the elements and praying for hope and salvation, these people suffer from the government, from the fighting, from the soldiers and from themselves. Their homes and livelihoods stolen from them and left with nothing to live on, these people persevered through such difficult times that it makes you appreciate modern times and growing up without war. This book tells a tale that is horrifying but needs to be told and keep being told again and again so that we can stop these atrocities before they happen in the future. This author captures all of this in every word he has written. This story will keep you engrossed from the start to the end and never let you go. I very much look forward to his next book as this is a talent that even the best authors have a difficult time with. Be prepared to keep reading well into the night as this book will ensnare you with the first chapter and not let you go until you are finished. Well done, Mr. Toyn, on your very first novel. I very much look forward to your next!

I loved the author's notes and references, we are told that this is a fictional read, but based on real people, sometimes a couple of people to make one, and the references that were used and offered!
This is a terrible time in world history, with this taking place in the Baltic area, and Russia.
Documented murders, a massive loss of life.
This is a fictional story, but the author did a great job of calling attention to the actual crimes being committed, disregard for human life. From Lithuania to Siberia, from the United States to Sweden.
The author brings the main characters alive, and I loved he followed through with the survivors through their lives.
A sad but enjoyable read!
I received this book through Net Galley and the Publisher American Legacy Media, and was not required to give a positive review.

It takes courage, determination - and some recklessness - to describe not one but several sides of WW2 under one cover. FROM MALICE TO ASHES: FOREST OF NO MERCY touches such topics as the Ponary massacre of Jews in Lithuania, Siberian work camps, POW camps in Germany, and exchange of POWs, among other things. Readers follow the main characters' stories, wondering who will survive and how the book will end. Drawing inspiration from the memoirs of real people and their remarkable stories of unbelievable luck and resilience, the author crafts a fast-paced historical fiction novel for those willing to delve deeper into WW2 than usual.

Unfortunately, the praise part of my review ends here. I was eager to read FROM MALICE TO ASHES as it could contribute to my previous knowledge of the war. I couldn't find Dalia Grinkevičiūtė’s book, so, when analyzing the story, I proceeded from my years of reading countless memoirs of Russians and Estonians, works of Timothy Snyder, Anne Applebaum, Prit Buttar, Richard Hargreaves, and countless others. Just in 2023, Prit Buttar published a book about the extermination of Jews in Lithuania, 'Centuries Will Not Suffice: A History of the Lithuanian Holocaust.' Richard Hargreaves released a book, 'Opening the Gates of Hell: Operation Barbarossa, June-July 1941,' this year, depicting atrocities committed by locals, retreating NKVD personnel, and Nazis in Romania, Ukraine, Poland, and the Baltic states.

I'll start with minor issues. The book has a problem with formatting: random words throughout the text are split by a dash (awkward-ness, Lithua-nians, know-ing), there is an uneven space between lines in a prologue and dialogue clutter, when sayings of different characters blend, toward the end of the book. Then there are stylistical mistakes: "His knuckles pounded against the door, clinging to a slim hope that she might still be home" (the door is clinging to the hope, not Olek). There is inappropriate modern language: "Mr. (pan ?) Kozlowski was my father," "that's my girl," "one of the those smart college girls," "gulag" (it meant the main administration of the camps' system, not ANY camp, back in the day). There are minor historical slips: Soviet soldiers smoked shag, not tobacco; spouses' and married/unmarried women's surnames differ in Lithuanian; prisoners of Soviet labor camps were never hanged but starved to death in damp solitary confinement cells; ordinary police didn't deal with camps; immigration quotas were already imposed before WW2, so it would be impossible for Al to get to America so soon.

The journey of Zeneta into Siberia and her time there raised one big question. If NKVD men waited for Zeneta and Matis near Riga, they had some suspicions of espionage, sabotage, you name it. What the NKVD men were looking for? What information did they need? Why didn't they execute the spouses? When Zeneta and Matis were transported out from Latvia, there was no Soviet fighting back, in the author's words. The Brest castle? The battle at Raseiniai was still going on.

The eastward roads/railways must have been jammed due to the flow of refugees. Zeneta and Matis had no water in a heated-up, sealed cattle wagon. They would have died before reaching Moscow. There are multiple accounts of people drinking their urine to stay hydrated. When the train stopped, women and girls jumped out of the wagon. After a week or so with no food and water? Matis and Zeneta went into the woods unsupervised. It's unbelievable. After a week with no water, there was no fighting over it? Zeneta just gave her mug to refill it as if she hadn't been thirsty at all. Another historical inaccuracy: prisoners were not given mugs. They had to use the utilities they had with them. Some even used children's toilet pots.

The camp life raised more questions. If they lived in barracks, was it a new camp? Then why weren't the prisoners supervised at all times? Where were the barbed wire, roll calls, and guard towers? If they had become a part of a kolhoz/sovhoz, then they would have lived with locals. Anyway, as the author notes later, those who didn't work didn't get the food. Zeneta would have starved to death. Old women were still assigned to work, and nobody cared about their health. Logic evaded the NKVD officials, and work often was back-breaking and senseless, like digging pits in minus forty on Kolyma. Light indoor work went to bytoviki or ordinary criminals. Ugna must have slept with dozens of bytoviki to get a bookkeeping position. Sexual exploitation was an open secret, and it shouldn't have come as a surprise to Ugna. There was nobody to complain about it. The camp's commendant would have rather starved her to death than admit that he had fathered a child with the enemy of the people, making him the enemy of the people as well.

And so on, and so on...

I loved Ugna's and Zeneta's flight from Siberia and Olek's and Mordecai's escape to Finland. But I was stopped in my reading on the depiction of the 1st of October 1944. During that chapter, Al shrugged twice and changed seats in a car (within one page). And there was no talk of the upcoming Babcia's funeral, although she died just 3 days before. The next chapter finishes with a repeated, yet slightly modified, scene from the first October chapter.

The book also needs editing. Take, for example, this paragraph: "Since the Russians came, I'll bet at least half of the Communist Party is made up of Jews (did Jews join the party when the Russians came? Or Jews were the party members from the very beginning? Or the character discovered that Russians were mostly Jews only when they came to Lithuania?) Maybe more. Like cockroaches, they (Jews) scampered over to the Soviets once they (Soviets) took over and then used that power (who used, Jews or Soviets?) to show their (whose?) true, disgusting nature." On the next page, we see the phrase "they scamper away to Russia" again. Or: "They (Jews) appear to be the intelligentsia, because they are well-dressed and appear to be well-off financially (isn't 'well-off' enough?). After they (Soviets) shoot a group of them (Jews), they (Soviets) make the next group shovel dirt over the people they (Soviets) just shot (shoot, shot - twice). So far, I have not seen any Germans doing the shooting (shooting - again)."

I rate this book 2.5 stars, rounded to 2. Half of the star is my hope that the author sent me a wrong copy, and the finished manuscript lacks logical, historical, and grammatical mistakes.

My review won't appear on any other platform, except Netgalley. However, I can't recommend the book as it is now to my friends and followers.

It was clear through the content, epilogue, and notes that the author took great care in creating fictionalized characters that adhered to historical events as best as possible. His narrative details a horrific event in history that few writers have presented. The narrative details the experiences of one extended family in short, interwoven chapters. The narrative piqued my interest to engage in additional research about the Ponary Forest and the WWII time period in Lithuania.

This is a great story, but in my opinion is poorly written. The following examples appear on a majority of the pages throughout the narrative.
Formatting: Repeatedly, in the middle of a line, the words simply stop, and the remainder of the line is blank. The reader must pick up again on a line beneath it. The writer struggled to integrate dialogue into the narrative. For example, when characters are speaking to each other in dialogue, sometimes the author starts a new paragraph when each character speaks and sometimes, he does not. Some dialogue throughout the narrative includes multiple people talking in the same paragraph back-to-back without attributing dialogue to a specific character. It felt confusing. I had to reread lines to clarify which character was speaking. There are copious words (I would venture to say every page) that are hyphenated and do not require hyphenation in the English language. There are many grammatical mistakes. Pronoun use is incorrect regarding numbers at times. Popular character's names are spelled differently at times; example, Saul verse Saule. The writer sometimes changes the tense of words in the same paragraph. The correct punctuation is not applied to all quotes. Bottom line is that it was the greatest number of errors I have seen in a book about to be published.

FROM MALICE TO ASHES by GARY W TOYN is a well researched and very interesting WW11 novel based on true stories, including the mostly unknown horrors revealed about the Ponary mass murders that took place in Lithuania from 1940 to 1944. We see how the Russian and Nazi occupations took advantage of the anti Semitism which was rife in Lithuania to help with their diabolical plans to rid the world of Jews……..
We move with the characters to camps in Poland and Siberia, where they suffer untold deprivation, showing incredible courage and unconditional love as they join with fellow sufferers sharing what little they have…….
The stories are true, as are the letters documenting the horrors of Ponary……..
It is a book worth reading for anyone who loves the Jewish people and feels compassion for those of all nationalties who suffered discrimation during this hideous war.
I was given a free copy of the book by NetGalley from American Legacy Media. The opinions in this review are completely my own.