Excerpt from Impossible Escape by Steve Sheinkin, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

About 9.5 million Jewish people lived in Europe at this time—just under 2 percent of the continent's population. By the summer of 1941, nearly the entire Jewish population of Europe lived in territory under Hitler's control.

Throughout his years in power, Hitler had often declared his desire to expel Jews from Germany. Now he decided on a very different course of action.

Hitler issued his orders directly to Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS. A longtime member of Hitler's inner circle, Himmler was a rabid antisemite, with a square mustache like his idol's. "For him I could do anything," Himmler said of his boss. "Believe me, if Hitler were to say I should shoot my mother, I would do it and be proud of his confidence."

As German troops tore through Europe, Himmler's SS established new concentration camps in occupied territory. One of the largest was Auschwitz, built on the grounds of a former army base in southern Poland. The first prisoners at Auschwitz were Polish political opponents of Hitler.

That would change as the war continued to expand.

Excerpted from Impossible Escape by Steve Sheinkin. Copyright © 2023 by Steve Sheinkin. Excerpted by permission of Roaring Brook Press. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.