Anne Frank is the second most read non-fiction book. It is second only to the Bible. This remarkable diary and its writer are a legend. Read by millions around the world, translated into many languages,The Diary of Anne Frank continues to amaze, move, and sadden. It makes you think and question the horrors of the war. Human life is precious; may the Holocaust never occur again.

The versions of the diary itself requires some explaining. Version A is Anne's original work in the diary itself. Version B is the diary that Anne went back and revised, edited, and added to. She had heard a broadcast that after the war, stories and diaries would be collected to tell the world of what the Dutch people went through. Anne intended to try publish a story called The Secret Annex telling how the people in the Secret Annex, as she called it, lived. Anne wrote, "Ten years after the war, people would find it amusing to see how we lived, what we ate and what we talked about as Jews in hiding." (March 29, 1944) Now the world knows and it far more sad than amusing. Version C is the version most people know and love. It is Versions A and B combined into an edited addition. Otto Frank eliminated some passages about Anne's coming awareness of her sexuality, her thoughts about her mother, and her comments that Otto Frank and his wife didn't love each other. Anne sensed this; her father never wanted to discuss it with her. Anne and her mother had bitter fights; Anne said she felt no love toward her.

The Definitive Edition has 30% more material than the The Diary of a Young Girl containing passages that were originally withheld. The two versions do not match word for word. If you want to be sure of Anne's original words, the Critical Edition has Versions A, B and C so if is easy to compare.

Aside from all that, reading Anne's diary gives you a true sense of what Jews all over Europe had to endure in the confined hiding places they were in. Anne hid with her mother, father, her older sister Margot, the van Daan family, and a dentist called Dussel for two years. Everyday there were constant problems and the threat of being discovered.

Reading Anne's diary moves you. It is easy to relate to Anne. She is open with the topics she is dealing with. Yet, she captures everything and relates it with detail far beyond her tender age. She was highly sensitive and loved life, even though loving life seemed impossible-just because she was a Jew.

The end of Anne's life was tragic-she died without anyone from her family with her since her sister had died a few days earlier-but Anne's wish to publish a story about her family's and the van Daan's ordeal came true.

I have read this book over and over again and it seems impossible that a teen girl could have such wisdom and maturity. But she did, and I can only wonder what she would have grown up to be like. Surely, she would have become a famous author! But she achieved that goal, in a sense, through her diary. Reading the diary is a powerful reminder of the effects of hate, but also the courage and will of the human spirit.

It is a book that everyone should read. It is true; the Holocaust did happen and may it never happen again. Anne's story is sad but beautiful. Her spirit will live on. Allow yourself to be touched by her; read the Diary of Anne Frank.

Recommended: Yes