30 January 2026
Life is Rosi
Rich chats to impressionist and actor Jess Robinson about her terrific debut book, (which she describes as Anne Frank meets Bridget Jones), Life is Rosi, an ambitious true story combining the diaries of 20 something Jess with the diaries of her grandmother, Rosi. They discuss the slightly forgotten first stages of the Holocaust where Polish Jews were expelled from Germany in 1938 and how Rosi's positivity helped her to survive this turbulent period, also the echoes of history that resonate for Jewish people now (even those who are not deemed Jewish enough by Jewish dating services). Plus the similarities and differences between these two young women, the unpleasant things that a hopeful though naive Jess had to endure on her own journey (but how all of us were susceptible to creeps in our younger years), how writing about experiences that we're uncomfortable about can help others (and ourselves), why Jess wanted to apply for citizenship of a country that had treated her grandmother so badly, the universality of family and how we often fail to learn the lessons of history. Plus the huge technical achievement of combining all these stories and managing to find the humour in it all.
Buy the book here - https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/rosi-jess-robinson/7840560
