Ruta’s Closet: A Holocaust Story from Lithuania | Episode 151

Is your TBR list giving you anxiety? Find out how you can read FASTER! Reader's Anxiety Relief 📚 BUY THE BOOK 👉Purchase Ruta’s Closet here: https://amzn.to/4gzMr8n 🎁 BOOKAHOLIC FREEBIE Want more book recommendations and author interviews? 📩 Join the Bookaholic Newsletter: https://www.book-a-holic.com/newsletter/ 👩🏽‍💻 ABOUT THE AUTHOR Keith Morgan was born in January 1954, in Blackpool, England. He began his career as a reporter for his hometown newspaper in Blackpool in 1975, moving to Vancouver, British Columbia, in 1980, where he is currently the Driving Editor, for The Province and Vancouver Sun newspapers. 🔗 CONNECT WITH Keith Website: https://www.rutascloset.com 💛 SUPPORT THE PODCAST ⭐ Leave a review on my website and socials. 📌 Subscribe on YouTube 📌Follow me on my TikTok, Facebook, Instagram @truebookaholic On The Bookaholic Podcast, Keith Morgan discusses his book Ruta’s Closet, centered on Ruth Krone-Siegel’s family surviving the Holocaust in the Šiauliai (Shavel) Lithuania ghetto while also recounting major events in the wider ghetto. Morgan explains how his childhood friendships with Jewish classmates, his reporting career in Vancouver, and a 1997 assignment led him to Ruth’s testimony, which inspired a successful four-part newspaper series for young readers and ultimately the book. He details the ghetto’s purpose as controlled, fenced slave labor, the role of the leather factory in survival, and Ruth’s traumatic loss of her sister Tamara during the children’s roundup. The conversation highlights Lithuania’s largely unknown Holocaust history, ongoing antisemitism, the need for “never forget/never again,” and educational tools on rutascloset.com, including a study guide and book-club talking points, plus plans for youth adaptations and expanded media projects. 00:00 Welcome and Premise 00:07 Why This Story Matters 02:25 Finding Ruth’s Story 02:46 Teen Promise to Journalist 04:45 First Talk at Center 05:45 Tamara’s Heartbreak 08:11 From Series to Book 09:38 Lithuania Hidden History 10:51 Sir Martin Gilbert’s Help 13:48 Baltics and Mass Killings 17:06 What a Ghetto Was 17:58 Survival Through Work 19:41 Life Inside the Ghetto 21:03 Returning to Lithuania 21:47 Smuggling and Public Hangings 22:56 Last Words Remembered 23:52 No Trigger Warnings 25:43 Never Forget Never Again 27:56 Warnings Before Nazis 29:02 Genocide Echoes Today 30:09 Propaganda Social Media 33:33 Denial And Education 35:08 Youth Version With AI 38:45 Podcasts And New Formats 41:32 Final Thanks And Tease Some links may be affiliate links, which means I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.