A public project by Opus Eternal
Sirens at Sunrise: October 7th Firsthand Accounts
A collection of firsthand accounts of the day that changed the world — interviewed, written, designed and published by Opus Eternal for the second anniversary of October 7th, and sold at cost so these testimonies are preserved and read as widely as they can be.
The book
On the morning of October 7, 2023, Hamas terrorists breached Israel's border and unleashed the deadliest attack on Jewish civilians since the Holocaust. In kibbutzim, at a music festival, in family homes, ordinary people faced unimaginable horror. These are their stories.
Raw, unflinching and deeply personal, these testimonies ensure that the truth of October 7th will never be forgotten. They speak for those who cannot speak, honor those who fell, and stand as testament to the resilience of those who survived.
This is not just history. This is memory made permanent.
- Firsthand accounts, told by the people who lived them
- 65 pages, in English
- Published by Opus Eternal for the second anniversary of October 7th
- Sold at cost — no profit is taken from a single copy
Sirens at Sunrise
Where to get it
Order a copy
Available worldwide and in Israel. We take nothing from either — the price covers printing and distribution, and no more.
How it was made
From first conversation to published book
The same process we use for a family memoir, carried all the way through to public publication.
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01
Firsthand interviews
Every account in the book comes from sitting down with someone who was there on October 7th, and listening. The same unhurried, empathetic interviewing we bring to every family we work with — no questionnaire, no rush, patience with the pauses.
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02
Each experience in its own voice
Every testimony was documented individually rather than blended into one narrative, keeping the details, the sequence and the language of the person telling it.
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03
Written, edited and designed
The accounts were shaped into readable chapters and edited for clarity without smoothing away what happened, then typeset and given a cover.
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04
Printed and published
Print files, listings and distribution: the book is available worldwide on Amazon and in Israel through Bookpod. The whole route, from the first conversation to a book anyone can order.
Why we made it
Preserving these accounts was the whole point.
This was a mission, not a commission. Nobody hired us to make this book; we made it because these testimonies needed to exist somewhere permanent, in the words of the people who lived them, before time and retelling wore the details away.
October 7th changed the world, and the firsthand accounts of it are the part most at risk. Memory shifts. Witnesses grow tired of being asked. Recordings sit on phones that get replaced. Preserving a testimony properly means capturing it carefully, writing it faithfully, and putting it somewhere it can't quietly disappear.
That's why it's a printed book. Posts scroll past and platforms shut down; a book sits on a shelf, gets lent to a neighbor, is catalogued and distributed, and will still be legible in eighty years.
And it's why it's sold at cost. Testimony only does its work when people actually encounter it, so we removed the one thing that would have kept it from spreading. Opus Eternal took no fee for the interviewing, writing, design or publishing, and takes no margin on any copy sold — what you pay covers printing and distribution, and nothing else.
Preservation first
The reason the project exists: getting these accounts recorded accurately and permanently, while the people who lived them are here to tell them.
No profit, by design
Interviewing, writing, design and publication were all donated. Not a shekel of margin sits on top of the price.
Priced to travel
Cost price in Israel and worldwide, so the barrier between a reader and these accounts is as low as we could make it.
Memory made permanent
Printed, catalogued and distributed — a record that outlives the feed it would otherwise have lived in.
A drop in the ocean
These accounts are a fraction of the ones that exist.
There are tens of thousands of firsthand stories from that day — survivors, families, first responders, soldiers, volunteers — and this book holds a handful of them. Every one of the others deserves the same care, and most of them have never been recorded by anyone.
If you have an account of October 7th, or you know someone whose story should be set down properly, we would consider it a privilege to help you preserve it — whether that becomes a book for your family alone or something published for everyone.
What this shows about our work
Most of our books are never sold. This one shows what happens when they are.
Almost everything we create is private: a short run of beautiful hardbacks for one family, given to children and grandchildren and no one else. That's usually exactly what people want, and it means our finished work is rarely something we can hand you to read.
Sirens at Sunrise is the exception. It was built from nothing — the interviews, the writing, the editing, the design, the cover, the print files, the listings — and published for anyone to buy. If you want to see the standard we work to, you can simply order it.
It also answers a question people often ask: yes, we can take a book all the way to public publication and retail distribution, not only to your family's bookshelf.
Interviewing that people open up to
The hardest conversations in this book were possible because of how they were held. See our process →
Design, print and publication
Typesetting, cover design, print-ready files and distribution, handled end to end. Book design & printing →
Your own life story
The same care, applied to the story you want your family to keep. Your life story →
Do you have a story that belongs on a shelf?
Whether it's for your family alone or for the wider world, we'll carry it from the first conversation to the finished book.
Book a free consultation