A Century of Wisdom

A Century of Wisdom is a stately and elegant book about an artist who found deliverance in her passion for music. Caroline Stoessinger writes with a special purity, as though she were arranging pearls on a string of silk. - Pat Conroy

I have rarely read a Holocaust survivor’s memoir as enriching and meaningful. Get Caroline Stoessinger’s book, A Century of Wisdom, telling Alice Herz-Sommer’s tale of her struggles and triumphs. You will feel rewarded. - Elie Wiesel

As one of millions who fell in love with Alice on YouTube, a 107-year-old Holocaust survivor who plays the piano and greets each day with no hint of bitterness, I’m grateful to Caroline Stoessinger for writing a book that explains this mystery. You will be inspired by the story of Alice Herz-Sommer, who lived to teach us. - Gloria Steinem

I’d walked on the cobblestones in Prague for thirty years wondering who might have walked on them before me: Kafka, Freud, Mahler. It feels like a miracle to have encountered, in Caroline Stoessinger’s wonderful book, Alice Herz-Sommer, who walked with them all - with a heart full of music. - Peter Sis

Caroline Stoessinger’s celebration of music and life, the meaning and legacy of Alice Herz-Sommer’s remarkable love-filled journey across the bitter hate-filled years of 20th-century madness is lyrical, compelling, and profoundly moving. This is an extraordinary, enchanting, entirely inspiring book - most timely and needed now. - Blanche Wiesen Cook, author of Eleanor Roosevelt

A sweetly affecting collection - Kirkus

From countless hours and interviews conducted over the course of several years, she has mined a treasure trove of insight and reflection. Herz-Sommer’s life is a tribute to the purity of artistic endeavor under the most devastating circumstances, and her refusal to be bitterly defined or essentially reshaped by tragedy is a testament to moral and spiritual courage. As the number of Holocaust survivors dwindles, it becomes increasingly important to capture and communicate their individual stories. - Booklist

A Century of Wisdom is universal and will enrich readers for generations to come - Itzhak Perlman