Raised in a small, ancient German community located deep in central Slovakia, Albin Greger came of age at a moment when Europe was tearing itself apart during the last years of World War II. During the Slovakian uprising of 1944, when the men and boys of his town were taken prisoner by partisan forces, Greger witnessed the starvation and execution of dozens of relatives and neighbors. Freed following a German counteroffensive, the teenage Greger returned to his hometown only to be inducted first into the Slovakian Home Guard, and later into the Waffen SS, the German army's elite fighting force - a force filled increasingly with raw teenagers and half-trained recruits. After several months in the trenches along a rapidly collapsing Eastern front, Greger's journey became a harrowing retreat through the ruins of a fallen world, and the beginning of a long journey towards a new one.
Raised in a small, ancient German community located deep in central Slovakia, Albin Greger came of age at a moment when Europe was tearing itself apart during the last years of World War II. During the Slovakian uprising of 1944, when the men and boys of his town were taken prisoner by partisan forces, Greger witnessed the starvation and execution of dozens of relatives and neighbors. Freed following a German counteroffensive, the teenage Greger returned to his hometown only to be inducted first into the Slovakian Home Guard, and later into the Waffen SS, the German army's elite fighting force - a force filled increasingly with raw teenagers and half-trained recruits. After several months in the trenches along a rapidly collapsing Eastern front, Greger's journey became a harrowing retreat through the ruins of a fallen world, and the beginning of a long journey towards a new one.
