As Far As My Feet Will Carry Me by Josef M. Bauer
January 12th, 2009Title: As Far As My Feet Will Carry Me
Author:Josef M. Bauer
Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing (1955)
I saw this book and thought it would be really interesting. I didn’t realize it was written such a long time ago…but that’s OK…it was a pretty exciting book. The weirdest thing about this book is that there are no chapter divisions, which makes it difficult to find a place to stop! This book was adapted into a German movie in 2001.
As Far As My Feet Will Carry Me by Josef M. Bauer is a true story of a German soldier’s escape from a Siberian labor camp and his 3 year trek to freedom. Clemens Forell was sentenced to twenty-five years of forced labor in a Siberian lead mine after World War II. As you can imagine, a Siberian lead mine is not a fantastic place to spend 25 years. After a few years in captivity he staged a pretty wild escape and got out. That’s the good news. The bad news is that he had to get across 8000 miles of Siberia.
His story of travelling that whole way is pretty crazy. He spent a lot of the time by himself walking across Siberia. He also spent time with various groups of people trying to stay away from the Soviet authorities.
At the risk of ruining the ending…he makes it back to Germany after three years. (Though I imagine you figured that out…how else would we know what happened!) The book was a pretty fast and fun read…and obviously Clemens Forell was quite an impressive man.
Rating: 3.5 out of 5
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January 13th, 2009 at 6:07 pm
Oh, that sounds so up my husband’s alley that I will have to give it to him for Valentine’s Day! He will think it a thoughtful, romantic gift, trust me. He likes any books that includes some variation on the “and then we had to eat the sled dogs” theme.
February 18th, 2009 at 3:58 pm
I just recently finished this story. Anyone interested in a good adventure will enjoy this one. Clemens Forell, despite the staggering odds against him, is a unrelenting survivor. An iron will to be envied
April 26th, 2009 at 11:49 pm
I read this book about 40 years ago and it still stays with me.It was a fantastic read and often comes to mind during those “And I think I’ve got it tough” moments.Inspirational