Book excerpt: Ukrainian Galicia was home to Poles, Jews and Ukrainians for hundreds of years. It was witness to both World Wars, starvation, mass killings and independence movements. Family members of the authors include survivors of German concentration camps and the GULAG prisons. They fought in Austrian, Polish, Russian and German armies, as well as in the Ukrainian pro-independence army. They were arrested by the Gestapo and the NKVD, tortured and even declared dead. They survived against the most unlikely odds. Their stories, shadows and secrets permeate this book and provide a rich background to some of the most dramatic events humanity has witnessed.