The Long Walk: The True Story of a Trek to Freedom [Paperback]

From page one this is a gripping and absorbing read. We start off with the capture and imprisonment of Polish cavalry officer Slavomir Rawicz, an ordeal that Franz Kafka would have been proud to have written. Accused of spying on the Russians, Slavomir is brutually tortured and beaten before being given a farcical trail that ends up with him being given the sentence of 25 years in a Siberian forced labour camp, on the basis of no evidence and a forged confession. It is here that the action begins to kick in to a more gung-ho spirit. Loaded into freezing cold railway cars and then slowly "chugged" across Russia, almost four thousand miles, to what was thought to be the prison. More agony is piled onto the men as they are chained together and frog marched hundreds of miles through bitter winds and biting snow blizzards until many weeks and many deaths later, prisoners and guards alike, the men finally arrive at their destination. It is a tribute to the writer that while writing of his tribulations he never once seems to feel bitter outrage or acrimony against his Siberian jailers, rather he feels an apathy for them as it seems to be indicated that even the guards here are victims of some small fault against the Russian mother state. Once the prison camp is reached, fans of great escape stories will become gripped as allegiances are formed and slowly an escape plan is hatched. To write too much would be to give too much away, but surfice to say that the team of seven men escape with some help from a very unexpected source and the escape is well and truly underway. From the freezing savage Siberian snow plains to the complete opposite but perhaps more unbearable searing heat of the Gobi, with only a couple of sticks and a tin mug between them, the story will simultaneously make you cry, laugh and occasionally feel proud to be human as the better sides of a man's personality and being are brought to light in a truly touching way. The end of the book comes all too soon, and one feels saddened that we do not learn more of our heros, but perhaps the story needs to finish there as perhaps to learn too much of what happened later might take some of the power from the story; and although part of me would like to know for certain the eventual fate of our intrepid adventurers, I feel they are given a more mythical stature by only existing up to the point of thier journeys completion. Forget trashy, clever, oh so chic summer novels about marketing executives trying to find their Mister Right whilst obsessing about everything they possibly can and lose yourself in a good old fashioned ripping yarn that deserves to go down as one of the greatest stories ever told.

....I tend to re-read this book in its entirety every year or so. I also read random chapters much more often and I have probably read this book more times than any other book that I own (The Great Escape comes second).

It's a great story of the hardships endured by prisoners of the Russian system in the early years of world war 2 and covers the capture of Slavomir Rawics while an officer in the Polish cavalry, his interrogation in Russia (for the crime of being a Polish cavalry officer) and the train journey and forced march to the Siberian prison camp with many deaths along the way. With the co-operation of the commandant's wife he has the opportunity to escape and finally does so with a small group of like minded prisoners.

Then begins another long period of torment as they set out to walk south to freedom, which they finally achieve in India.

A great read.

Every now and again one comes across a book which though is so clearly the experience of the author it nevertheless beggars belief. It is, though, almost impossible to believe that anyone could make up so many elements of this epic. The author is a man who writes compellingly; I truly found it hard to put down, almost led on by the horror and relentless suffering as by wanting to know what happened next. Please don't be put off by that statement, though. The horror was real, is real as you read it, but the dominating feeling is one of the towering human Spirit that overcomes the incredible adversity this man and his friends endured. This book inspired me and left me wondering how on Earth anyone could get through this, and how would I fare under those conditions? The truth is I don't know but I fear nowhere near as well. If you want a book that is inspiring and leaves you breathless, this is one to buy.
Some months later . .
Since writing the review above I have come across criticism and a heated debate over the possibility that this book was not written by the author but plagiarised from another's work and dressed up considerably.
The thought this may be so was disappointing but on examining the evidence I find myself still believing in the authenticity of this book and the author. There are too many questions of a fundamental nature that even the author's detractors do not address and some take on controversial elements in the book and use prejudice as part of the argument to undermine the whole thing.
The author is no longer around to defend himself - how many times does THAT happen! - and so it is ultimately left to the reader to decide and then it becomes a matter of opinion. I do, however, believe in the book, the story and the author and the more I consider it the more I find reasons to. Unfortunately detractors find the sounds of their own voices preferably to reasoned and considered thought.
Buy this book, be inspired and be moved.