Under the Third Reich, Nazi Germany undertook an unprecedented effort to refashion the city of Lodź. Home to prewar Poland's second most populous Jewish community, this was to become a German city of enchantment--a modern, clean, and orderly showcase of urban planning and the arts. Central to the undertaking, however, was a crime of unparalleled dimension: the ghettoization, exploitation, and ultimate annihilation of the city's entire Jewish population.

Ghettostadt is the terrifying examination of the Jewish ghetto's place in the Nazi worldview. Exploring ghetto life in...