Doing the Anne Frank thing again. Why?

Memories of Anne Frank: Reflections of a Girlhood Friend
by Alison Leslie Gold




First to explain--the memories are from Hannah Goslar as told to Alison Leslie Gold. So I'll refer the Ms. Gold as the author and Ms. Goslar as Ms. Goslar,

The only things to dislike about this book are the name and the editing. It's a memoir and you can't blast people's memories unless  you were there with them and knew they'd made the stuff up. Not that I think she did make stuff up--I'm just explaining why "content" is not a criteria I can judge on.  I wish there were a little more content, but I'd rather have a sketchy truth than a made-up memory.  But--[to the author]--why isn't there more content?  I feel like Ms. Goslar was given the task of (a) remember everything you can about Anne Frank and (b) you can add on a little from your own life story, but (c) keep it short and (d) be sure to toss in mention of Anne Frank from time to time.

In other words, Ms. Goslar had a story to tell--and this isn't it.  Why couldn't it be?   Why was the scope so severely limited?

And the title sucks. If they had to put in the title to make people want to read the book,
they could have done so without distorting what the book is mostly about.  There's a lot more here than just Anne, and could have been more still if Ms. Goslar had been encouraged to tell it and Ms. Gold interested in writing it.



Anne Frank