The View from Alger's Window: A Son's Memoir

This excellent book is beautifuly written and proves the sterling character of Alger Hiss. Hiss was framed by three of America's mid-century most evil men...Richard Nixon, Whitaker Chambers and J. Edgar Hoover. Alger Hiss was a Jeffersonian democrat who will be honored in the long run of history as a key man in the Roosevelt administration and the Secretary General of the United Nations during its founding conference in San Francisco in 1945. Pass the book along to your grandchildren,for it will become a valuable document of 20th Century America.

"The View from Alger's Window" is a memoir, simply and beautifully told, of a sensitive, perceptive boy growing up in the most unusual of circumstances. In my work as a therapist, I quest for ways to help patients turn adversity to advantage. I found tremendous value in the story of how Alger Hiss, imprisoned at the height of his career, saw jail as a place for "learning and growing," not a place to become bitter. Tony Hiss's story of his own psychological development is also revelatory-how he became emotionally frozen, how he created his own identity, how he grew up in the shadow of Alger Hiss and also in his father's light. Let the controvery over Alger Hiss's guilt or innocence rage elsewhere. Tony Hiss's story is a unique one, uniquely told.

This is not a book about the guilt or innocence of Alger Hiss. It is a book about growing up with an enormously playful, intelligent and kind father who was demonized by the media and popular thought. It is a tragedy that Alger Hiss's incarceration was the turning point in his relationship with his son, Tony.Tony Hiss did not write THE VIEW FROM ALGER'S WINDOW about the Hiss case; he wrote it about his relationship with his father. It is moving, beautifully written, fascinating -- a window into the mind of a man whom few knew, and into the boy who now, as a father himself, looks back at his own childhood.Those who see this book as anything other than that are grossly deluded.

For every parent who has endured separation from a child, for every childhood filled wiwth longing to connect with an absent parent, Tony Hiss's beeautifully written memoir touches the heart. Played against the trial of the century, this is a true American classic, Father's Day book of the year.