Sunday, January 25, 2026, 11:00 am - 12:30 pm
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Join us in welcoming back Ron Balson!
At the end of 1943, nearly all of Europe’s Jewish population had been deported, captured or killed by Hitler, or had fled; only Hungary retained almost 800,000 Jews. They lived under edicts and restrictions, but without fear of being murdered. That changed in March 1944, after the Nazi defeat at Stalingrad, as a desperate Hitler accelerated his plan for mass extermination.
With the notorious Adolf Eichmann supervising the process, Hungary began rounding up its Jewish population. In this dramatic new novel by Ronald H. Balson, The Righteous, US State Department diplomat Teddy Hartigan and his wife Julia set out to rescue as many people as they can. Working with the newly-formed War Review Board, diplomats from neutral nations, and underground resistance groups, Teddy and Julia make contact with Swedish businessman Raoul Wallenberg. Wallenberg’s connections and skills make him the perfect candidate to work within the complex network of public and secret diplomacy, as he, Teddy, Julia, and others take enormous risks to save tens of thousands of lives.
Ronald H. Balson is an attorney, professor, and writer. His novel The Girl From Berlin won the National Jewish Book Award and was the Illinois Reading Council’s adult fiction selection for the Illinois Reads program. He is also the author of Eli’s Promise, a Target Book Club selection, A Place to Hide, An Affair of Spies, Defending Britta Stein, Karolina’s Twins, The Trust, Saving Sophie, and the international bestseller, Once We Were Brothers. He lives in Chicago.
Buy your copy of his book from Bookshop.org (to support independent bookstores) or amazon.com.
This ongoing series has been made possible by a grant from the B’nai Sholom/Beth El Foundation.
Please register below. Zoom information will be emailed the week of the program.