Includes bibliographical references.

I looked up the name in the phone book and rang the number. I tried to imagine the conversation that might ensue. 'Hello? I was wondering if you're the man who was recently at an auction and asked a woman named Mary if I was married and had children and was happy - and if you are, are you my real father? Ramona Koval's parents were Holocaust survivors who fled their homeland and settled in Melbourne. As a child, Koval learned little about their lives - only snippets from traumatic tales of destruction and escape. But she always suspected that the man who raised her was not her biological father.