” Herman Rosenblat and his wife are the most gentle, loving, beautiful people,” literary agent Andrea Hurst said Sunday, anguishing over why she, and so many others, were taken in by his story of love born on opposite sides of a concentration camp fence. “I question why I never questioned it. I believed it; it was an incredible, hope-filled story.”

On Saturday, Berkley Books canceled Rosenblat’s memoir, “Angel at the Fence.” He has acknowledged that he and his wife did not meet, as they had said for years, at a sub-camp of Buchenwald, Germany, where she allegedly sneaked him apples and bread. Rosenblat, 79, actually met his wife of 50 years, the former Roma Radzicky, on a blind date in New York.

In a statement issued Saturday through his agent, Rosenblat described himself as an advocate of love and tolerance who falsified his past to better spread his message. His believers had included not only his agent and his publisher, but Oprah Winfrey , film producers, journalists and family members, as well as total strangers.