The novella describes "Joy Divisions", which were groups of women imprisoned in the concentration camps during World War II who were kept for the sexual pleasure of other inmates.

The novel tells the story of a Jewish woman named Daniella who is "forced to become a prostitute for German soldiers ... in Block 24 of Auschwitz-Stammlager.

Lentin notes that the "explicit, painful" story made a huge impact when published and states that "many children of holocaust survivors who write would agree ... that House of Dolls represents violence and sexuality in a manner which borders on the pornographic".

[6] Na'ama Shik, researching at Yad Vashem, the principal Jewish organization for the remembrance of the victims of the Holocaust, considers the book as fiction.

However Yechiel Szeintuch from the Hebrew University rejects links between the smutty Stalags on the one hand, and Ka-Tzetnik's works, which he insists were based on reality, on the other.