THESE BOOKS BELONG to a sub-genre of 'Holocaust literature' in which the descendants of refugees or survivors ruminate on the experience of their forebears and its trans-generational effect. But are all stories of survival automatically interesting? Conversely, are the humdrum lives of people who fell victim to a monstrous regime elevated by the awful circumstances of their fate?

Peter Singer, one of the world's leading moral philosophers, pieced together his grandfather's story with the hope that by reconstructing a life that the Nazis obliterated he could repair some of the damage they inflicted. He admits that he was also curious to find out if any 'parallels' existed between