Nonfiction Resources P-S
Pausewang, G. (1996). The final journey. (P. Crampton, Trans.). London: Viking.
“During World War II, eleven-year-old Alice, whose life has been sheltered and comfortable, discovers some important things about herself and the people she meets when she and her grandfather board a train and begin an increasingly intolerable journey to an unknown destination.”
summary from http://catalog2.loc.gov/vwebv/holdingsInfo?searchId=40427&recCount=25&recPointer=15&bibId=1647905
Age Range: 12-17 years
Reading Level: AR Level – 5.3; 720L
Teacher’s Guide:
Pawel, U. (2000). My child is back! London: Vallentine Mitchell.
“In this work, the author relates her experiences in Germany from her birth in 1926 to the start of a new life in the US after the World War II. Her father was a Jew, her mother a Christian, and although their marriage shocked some relatives, such ‘mixed marriages’ were not uncommon in the 1920s. She had a happy early childhood, but with Hitler’s rise to power, persecution of Jews, including ‘half Jews’ like her, started immediately. Her mother rejected all Nazi pressure to divorce ‘the Jewish’, and some of the non-Jews relatives gave the family loyal support. When her parents finally recognized their mortal danger, it was too late. In 1942, she was sent to a concentration camp. The family pleaded to join her so that they could stay together, but only her father and brother, then 12 years old, were permitted to go with her, ultimately to their deaths at Auschwitz. Her life was narrowly saved by the baffling intervention of two German soldiers, and after the advancing Russians liberated her in 1945, she made a 500-mile trek across the occupation zones for a reunion with her mother in western Germany. She and her mother finally settled in the U.S. in 1947.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/my-child-is-back-ursula-pawel/1114038392?ean=9780853034049
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Perl, L. & Lazan, M. B. (1996). Four perfect pebbles. New York: Greenwillow Books.
Publisher description http://www.loc.gov/catdir/description/hc044/95009752.html
Contributor biographical information http://www.loc.gov/catdir/enhancements/fy0911/95009752-b.html
“Marion Blumenthal was not quite five years old in 1939 when her family fled Germany for Holland, ending up in the relative safety of Westerbork, then a refugee camp run by the Dutch government. They had visas for the U.S. and tickets for an ocean crossing, but during a fatal three-month postponement of their sailing, the Germans invaded Holland. By 1944 the Blumenthals arranged to be part of a group bound for Palestine in exchange for the release of German POWs; the family was instead sent to Bergen-Belsen, where they remained, together, in the so-called Family Camp. Marion, her brother and parents survived the war, but her father died of typhus several months after liberation. Written in the third person . . . it is unusually complete, not only in its skillful presentation of the historical context but in its treatment of the Blumenthals’ horrifying journey. Quotes from Lazan’s 87-year-old mother are invaluable-her memories of the family’s experiences afford Marion's story a precision and wholeness rarely available to child survivors.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/four-perfect-pebbles-lila-perl/1102398235?ean=9780380731886
Age Range: 8-12 years
Reading Level: AR Level – 7.3; 1080L
Teacher’s Guides:
(BookRags Lesson Plan) BN ID: 2940014804813
(BookRags Summary) BN ID: 2940013943568
Porat, D. (2010). The boy: A Holocaust story. New York: Hill and Wang.
“A cobblestone road. A sunny day. A soldier. A gun. A child, arms high in the air. A moment captured on film. But what is the history behind arguably the most recognizable photograph of the Holocaust? In The Boy: A Holocaust Story, the historian Dan Porat unpacks this split second that was immortalized on film and unravels the stories of the individuals—both Jews and Nazis—associated with it.
“The Boy presents the stories of three Nazi criminals, ranging in status from SS sergeant to low-ranking SS officer to SS general. It is also the story of two Jewish victims, a teenage girl and a young boy, who encounter these Nazis in Warsaw in the spring of 1943. The book is remarkable in its scope, picking up the lives of these participants in the years preceding World War I and following them to their deaths. One of the Nazis managed to stay at large for twenty-two years. One of the survivors lived long enough to lose a son in the Yom Kippur War. Nearly sixty photographs dispersed throughout help narrate these five lives. And, in keeping with the emotional immediacy of those photographs, Porat has deliberately used a narrative style that, drawing upon extensive research, experience, and oral interviews, places the reader in the middle of unfolding events.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/boy-dan-porat/1100941855?ean=9780809030729
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Prins, M. & Steenhuis, P. H. (2014). Hidden like Anne Frank: Fourteen true stories of survival. New York: Arthur A. Levine Books.
“Fourteen unforgettable true stories of children hidden away during World War II.
“Jaap Sitters was only eight years old when his mother cut the yellow stars off his clothes and sent him, alone, on a fifteen-mile walk to hide with relatives. It was a terrifying night, one he would never forget. Before the end of the war, Jaap would hide in secret rooms and behind walls. He would suffer from hunger, sickness, and the looming threat of Nazi raids. But he would live.
“This is just one of the incredible stories told in Hidden Like Anne Frank, a collection of eye-opening first-person accounts that share what it was like to go into hiding during World War II. Some children were only three or four years old when they were hidden; some were teenagers. Some hid with neighbors or family, while many were with complete strangers. But all know the pain of losing their homes, their families, even their own names. They describe the secret network of brave people who kept them safe. And they share the coincidences and close escapes that made all the difference.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/hidden-like-anne-frank-marcel-prins/1116781088?ean=9780545543620
Age Range: 12-17 years
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Rabinovici, S. (1998). Thanks to my mother. (J. Skofield, Trans.). New York: Dial Books.
“Susie Weksler was only eight when Hitler’s forces invaded her Lithuanian city of Vilnius. Over the next few years, she endured starvation, brutality, and forced labor in three concentration camps. With courage and ingenuity, Susie's mother helped her to survive—by disguising her as an adult to fool the camp guards, finding food to add to their scarce rations, and giving her the will to endure. This harrowing memoir portrays the best and worst of humanity in heartbreaking scenes you will never forget.
“After struggling to survive in Nazi-occupied Lithuania, a young Jewish girl and her mother endure much suffering in Kaiserwald, Stutthof, and Tauentzien concentration camps and on an eleven-day death march before being liberated by the Russian army.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/thanks-to-my-mother-schoschana-rabinovici/1101075115?ean=9780141305967
Winner, Batchelder Award, 1999
Age Range: 12-17 years
Reading Level: AR Level – 6.2; 790L
Teacher’s Guide:
_____. (2012). Beyond courage: The untold story of Jewish resistance during the Holocaust. Somerville, MA: Candlewick Press.
“Under the noses of the military, Georges Loinger smuggles thousands of children out of occupied France into Switzerland. In Belgium, three resisters ambush a train, allowing scores of Jews to flee from the cattle cars. In Poland, four brothers lead more than 1,200 ghetto refugees into the forest to build a guerilla force and self-sufficient village. And twelve-year-old Motele Shlayan entertains German officers with his violin moments before setting off a bomb. Through twenty-one meticulously researched accounts — some chronicled in book form for the first time — Doreen Rappaport illuminates the defiance of tens of thousands of Jews across eleven Nazi-occupied countries during World War II. In answer to the genocidal madness that was Hitler’s Holocaust, the only response they could abide was resistance, and their greatest weapons were courage, ingenuity, the will to survive, and the resolve to save others or to die trying.
“Extensive end matter includes:
- timeline of important events
- index
- pronunciation guide
- source notes
- maps integrated throughout text”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/beyond-courage-doreen-rappaport/1110779151?ean=9780763669287
Honor Book, Sydney Taylor Book Award, 2013
YALSA “Popular Paperbacks – Narrative Nonfiction”, 2015
Age Range: 11-13 years
Reading Level: AR Level – 7.4; 1030L
Teacher’s Guide:
Reiss, J. (1972). The upstairs room. New York: Harper Keypoint.
“When the German army occupied Holland, Annie de Leeuw was eight years old. Because she was Jewish, the occupation put her in grave danger – she knew that to stay alive she would have to hide. Fortunately, a Gentile family, the Oostervelds, offered to help. For two years they hid Annie and her sister, Sini, in the cramped upstairs room of their farmhouse.
“Most people thought the war wouldn’t last long. But for Annie and Sini — separated from their family and confined to one tiny room — the war seemed to go on forever.
“Mrs. Reiss’s picture of the Oosterveld family with whom she lived, and of Annie and Sini, reflects a deep spirit of optimism, a faith in the ingenuity, backbone, and even humor with which ordinary human beings meet extraordinary challenges. In the steady, matter-of-fact, day-by-day courage they all showed lays a profound strength that transcends the horrors of the long and frightening war. Here is a memorable book, one that will be read and reread for years to come.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/upstairs-room-johanna-reiss/1100426909?ean=9780064403702
Honor Book, Newbery Award, 1973
National Jewish Book Award – Children’s Literature, 1973
Age Range: 8-12 years
Reading Level: AR Level – 2.9; 380L
Teacher’s Guides:
(BookRags Literature Summary) BN ID: 2940012505453
(Novel-Ties Study Guide) ISBN-13: 9780767518857
_____. (1976). The journey back. New York: Crowell.
“The Second World War is over. Annie and her sister Sini, who have been hiding from the Germans for almost three years, are free again. They leave the hamlet of Usselo and the Oosterveld family that had sheltered them and return to their hometown. Their father also survived as did their sister, Rachel. The Journey Back tells of what can happen to members of a family, Jews in this case, when reunion demonstrates they no longer know each other. The book speaks for all people at all times and is as moving as its predecessor, The Upstairs Room.
“After spending three years hiding from the Nazis, a Jewish family is reunited and begins the job of rebuilding their country and family.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-journey-back-johanna-reiss/1001819065?ean=9780595430505
Age Range:
Reading Level: AR Level – 3.5; 520L
Teacher’s Guide:
Reiter, A. (Ed.). (2006). Children of the Holocaust. London: Vallentine Mitchell.
“Children of the Holocaust contains the papers delivered at a conference to mark Holocaust Remembrance Day 2004, which was held under the auspices of the AHRC Parkes Centre at the University of Southampton. The book addresses questions of representation of the Holocaust by and of children, both in text and image. While the volume opens with a theoretical discussion of how and where to locate the voice of the child in a text, the majority of contributions deal with exemplary texts either by single authors or specific groups of survivors. The testimonies at the heart of these essays were written in different European languages, mainly in German, English and Polish. The authors offer a variety of perspectives, ranging from the literary to the historical and art-critical. With its wide range of examples and approaches to the theme, this volume proposes to be more than a concise introduction to the theme of children of the Holocaust. It documents the breadth of issues of this branch of Holocaust studies, which is still largely waiting to be discovered.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/children-of-the-holocaust-andrea-reiter/1007288646?ean=9780853036272
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Richman, S. (2002). A wolf in the attic: The legacy of a hidden child of the Holocaust. New York: Haworth Press.
“A Wolf in the Attic is a powerful memoir written by a psychoanalyst who was a hidden child in Poland during World War II. Her story, in addition to its immediate impact, illustrates her struggle to come to terms with the powerful yet sometimes subtle impact of childhood trauma...
“Born during the Holocaust in what was once a part of Poland, Sophia Richman spent her early years in hiding in a small village near Lwów, the city where she was born. Hidden in plain sight, both she and her mother passed as Christian Poles. Later, her father, who escaped from a concentration camp, found them and hid in their attic until the liberation.
“The story of the miraculous survival of this Jewish family is only the beginning of their long journey out of the Holocaust. The war years are followed by migration and displacement as the refugees search for a new homeland. They move from Ukraine to Poland to France and eventually settle in America. A Wolf in the Attic traces the effects of the author’s experiences on her role as an American teen, a wife, a mother, and eventually, a psychoanalyst.
“A Wolf in the Attic explores the impact of early childhood trauma on the author’s: education; career choices; attitudes toward therapy, both as patient and therapist; social interactions; love/family relationships; parenting style and decisions regarding her daughter; and religious orientation.
“Repeatedly told by her parents that she was too young to remember the war years, Sophia spent much of her life trying to ‘remember to forget’ what she did indeed remember. A Wolf in the Attic follows her life as she gradually becomes able to reclaim her past, to understand its impact on her life and the choices she has made, and finally, to heal a part of herself that she had been so long taught to deny.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/a-wolf-in-the-attic-sophia-richman/1112130388?ean=9780789015501
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Robbins, T. (2011). Lily Renée, escape artist: From Holocaust survivor to comic book pioneer. Minneapolis, MN: Graphic Universe.
“In 1938, Lily Renée Wilheim is a 14-year-old Jewish girl living in Vienna. Her days are filled with art and ballet. Then the Nazis march into Austria, and Lily's life is shattered overnight. Suddenly, her own country is no longer safe for her or her family. To survive, Lily leaves her parents behind and travels alone to England.
“Escaping the Nazis is only the start of Lily’s journey. She must escape many more times—from servitude, hardship, and danger. Will she find a way to have her own sort of revenge on the Nazis? Follow the story of a brave girl who becomes an artist of heroes and a true pioneer in comic books.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/lily-ren-e-escape-artist-trina-robbins/1110853948?ean=9780761381143
Honor Book, Sydney Taylor Book Award, 2012
Age Range: 10-14 years
Reading Level: AR Level – 4.2; GN510L
Teacher’s Guide:
Rosen, R. D. (2014). Such good girls: The journey of the Holocaust’s hidden child survivors. New York: HarperCollins.
“While the vast majority of Holocaust books concentrate on the Holocaust experience itself, in the case of Such Good Girls [the author] sought to tell not just the stories of how three girls survived the Holocaust in three different countries, but how the horrors of their childhoods affected them—and other hidden child survivors, the last living eyewitnesses to Hitler’s Final Solution—throughout their lives.”
summary from http://rdrosen.com/such-good-girls/
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Rosenberg, J. G. (2005). East of time. Blackheath, New South Wales, Australia: Brandl & Schlesinger.
“This book is a rendezvous of history and imagination and dreams and of hopes and disenchantments. It unfolds in a succession of reminiscences that weave together a shimmering tapestry depicting a lost world. The setting is Łódź, Poland, in the years between the author’s childhood and early maturity, a period overtaken by the cataclysmic events of the 1930s and early 1940s. The narrative approach presents a powerful personal testament and reflects the determination of an entire community to remain human in the face of its greatest peril, even at the last frontier of life.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/east-of-time-jacob-rosenberg/1102349704?ean=9780817354497
Winner, New South Wales Premier’s Award for Best Non-Fiction, 2006
Short-list, Australian Literary Society’s Gold Medal, 2006
Short-list, South Australian Arts Festival Award for Innovation in Literature, 2006
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Rosenberg, M. B. (1994). Hiding to survive: Stories of Jewish children rescued from the Holocaust. New York: Clarion Books.
Publisher description http://www.loc.gov/catdir/description/hm021/93028328.html
“First-person accounts of fourteen Holocaust survivors who as children were hidden from the Nazis by non-Jews.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/hiding-to-survive-maxine-b-rosenberg/1114793264?ean=9780395900208
Age Range:
Reading Level: AR Level – 5.9; 910L
Teacher’s Guide:
Rosner, B. & Tubach, F. C. (2001). An uncommon friendship: From opposite sides of the Holocaust. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Contributor biographical information http://www.loc.gov/catdir/bios/ucal052/00053207.html
Table of contents http://www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/ucal041/00053207.html
Publisher description http://www.loc.gov/catdir/description/ucal042/00053207.html
“In 1944, 13-year-old Fritz Tubach was almost old enough to join the Hitler Youth in his German village of Kleinheubach. That same year in tab, Hungary, 12-year-old Bernie Rosner was loaded onto a train with the rest of the village’s Jewish inhabitants and taken to Auschwitz, where his whole family was murdered. Many years later, after enjoying successful lives in California, they met, became friends, and decided to share their intimate story—that of two boys trapped in evil and destructive times, who became men with the freedom to construct their own future, with each other and the world.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/uncommon-friendship-bernat-rosner/1101834234?ean=9780520261310
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Rubin, S. G. (2006). The cat with the yellow star: Coming of age in Terezín. New York: Holiday House.
“This incredible memoir with a strong curriculum tie-in about a young Holocaust survivor’s coming of age in the Terezín concentration camp . . .
“Ela Stein was eleven years old in February of 1942 when she was sent to the Terezín concentration camp with other Czech Jews. The horrendous three-and-a-half years she spent there were full of sickness, terror, separation from loved ones, and loss; yet Ela forged lifelong friendships with other girls from Room 28 of her barracks. Adults working with the children tried their best to keep up the youngest prisoners’ spirits. A children’s opera called Brundibár was even performed, and Ela was chosen to play the pivotal role of the cat. Full of sorrow, yet persistent in its belief that humans can triumph over evil, this unusual memoir tells the story of an unimaginable coming of age.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-cat-with-the-yellow-star-susan-goldman-rubin/1114063161?ean=9780823418312
Notable Book, Sydney Taylor Award – Older Readers, 2007
Age Range: 8-12 years
Reading Level: AR Level – 5.0; 800L
Teacher’s Guide:
Rubinstein, E. (1986). The survivor in us all: Four young sisters in the Holocaust. Hamden, CT: Archon Books.
“Rubinstein has written a fine book recounting her experiences as a polish Jew who, with her three sisters, survived the concentration camps where her father, mother, and young brother perished. The book is simply written, yet its very simplicity heightens its emotional impact.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-survivor-in-us-all-erna-f-rubinstein/1001846244?ean=9780208021298
Age Range: 12 years
Reading Level: AR Level – 5.5
Teacher’s Guide:
_____. (1995). After the Holocaust: The long road to freedom. North Haven, CT: Archon Books.
“Having survived Auschwitz, the author and her three sisters try to begin life anew in war-torn Europe.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/after-the-holocaust-erna-f-rubinstein/1000554157?ean=9780208024213
Age Range: 12 years
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Samson, N. (2000). Hide: A child’s view of the Holocaust. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.
“In 1942 German Nazis and Polish collaborators drove nine-year-old Naomi Rosenberg and her family from the town of Goray, Poland, and into hiding. For nearly two years they were forced to take refuge in a crawl space beneath a barn. In this tense and moving memoir, the author tells of her terror and confusion as a child literally buried alive. Her family owed their survival to the reluctant and constantly wavering support of the barn owners, gentiles torn between compassion for Naomi’s family and fear of a Nazi death sentence if the family was discovered.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/hide-naomi-samson/1112183615?ean=9780803292727
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Samuels, D. (1995). Kindertransport. New York: Plume.
“In 1938, seven-year-old Eva Schlesinger is put aboard a train filled with other Jewish children and carried away from Nazi Germany in a little-known rescue operation called Kindertransport. More than four decades later, she had become a quintessential Englishwoman who hides her origins from everyone, including her own daughter. Here in Kindertransport her past and present collide. We see the terrified child who possesses only two gold rings and a Star of David hidden in the heel of her shoe to link her to the parents she left behind. And we watch the grown woman who had tried to forget the Kindertransport at the moment when her daughter discovers a storage box of papers. As her daughter questions her, a shattering truth emerges about Eva’s identity, the true cost of survival, and the future that grows out of a traumatized past.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/kindertransport-diane-samuels/1101062824?ean=9781854595270
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Schiller, M. (2007). Bread, butter, and sugar: A boy’s journey through the Holocaust and postwar Europe. Lanham, MD: Hamilton Books.
“Based on the true story of Martin Schiller, a child survivor of the Holocaust, this gripping memoir describes the unfolding horror of the Nazi genocide seen through the eyes of a child. ‘Menek’ (Schiller’s childhood nickname) was six years old when the Nazis invaded Poland, and his family fled eastward from their native Tarnobrzeg. He was nine when he and his family were interned as slave laborers at the Skarzysko concentration camp, where his father perished. As the Russian army advanced, Menek and his brother were deported to Buchenwald, where Menek survived with the help of a sympathetic Block Elder (a German political prisoner) who placed him in a barrack for Russian POWs. The story of his journey continues after liberation, with their harrowing escape from postwar Poland; the brothers’ travels through war-ravaged Germany to find their mother; and the anxiety of the DP camps where the family must decide between Israel [and] America. This memoir covers the now-emblematic features of a survivor’s journey both during and after the war with the intimacy of a young boy’s point-of-view, recalling his own thoughts and reactions to events as he tries to make sense of an irrational world.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/bread-butter-and-sugar-martin-schiller/1101462710?ean=9780761835714
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Schloss, E. (2010). Eva’s story: A survivor’s tale by the stepsister of Anne Frank. Grand Rapids, MI: W. B. Edermans Publishing Co.
“Many know the tragic story of Anne Frank, the teen whose life ended at Auschwitz during the Holocaust. But most people don’t know about Eva Schloss, Anne’s playmate and stepsister. Though Eva, like Anne, was taken to Auschwitz at the age of 15, her story did not end there.
“This incredible memoir recounts – without bitterness or hatred – the horrors of war, the love between mother and daughter, and the strength and determination that helped a family overcome danger and tragedy.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/evas-story-eva-schloss/1102879962?ean=9780802864956
NOTE: There are many renditions of the story of Eva Schloss, the stepsister of Anne Frank.
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Schroeder, P. W. & Schroeder-Hildebrand, D. (2004). Six million paper clips: The making of a children’s Holocaust memorial. Minneapolis, MN: Kar-Ben Publishing.
“With clear and concise language, color photographs, and an attractive layout, this book tells the inspiring and touching story of the teachers, students, and community of Whitwell Middle School in Tennessee, and their quest to understand and teach about the Holocaust. The authors, White House correspondents for a group of German newspapers, helped the school publicize the project to collect six million paper clips to show just how many people were murdered and obtained a German railcar to house them. The book includes a lot of quotes and behind-the-scenes information. Footnotes help to define unfamiliar terms . . . Schroeder and Schroeder-Hildebrand’s title will be a helpful and accessible resource for Holocaust educators and students, as well as independent readers.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/six-million-paper-clips-peter-w-schroeder/1112538591?ean=9781580131766
Age Range: 8-13 years
Reading Level: AR Level – 5.9; 870L
Teacher’s Guide:
Sender, R. M. (1986). The cage. New York: Macmillan.
“After Mama is taken away by the Nazis, Riva and her younger brothers cling to their mother’s brave words to help them endure life in the Łòdź ghetto. Then the family is rounded up, deported to Auschwitz, and separated. Now Riva is alone.
“At Auschwitz, and later in the work camps at Mittlesteine and Grafenort, Riva vows to live, and to hope – for Mama, for her brothers, for the millions of other victims of the nightmare of the Holocaust. And through determination and courage, and unexpected small acts of kindness, she does live – to write the unforgettable memoir that is a testament to the strength of the human spirit.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/cage-ruth-minsky-sender/1100623218?ean=9780689813214
Age Range: 14-17 years
Reading Level: AR Level – 3.7; 500L
Teacher’s Guide: (BookRags Summary) BN ID: 2940012984258
_____. (1988). To life. New York: Macmillan.
“When Russian soldiers liberate Grafenort, the Nazi labor camp where she is a prisoner, nineteen-year-old Riva discovers that liberation doesn’t mean the end of her hardship and suffering.
“Cold and starving, threatened with rape by the same Russian soldiers who were her saviors, Riva makes her way to her old home in Poland, searching like so many others for family who may have survived. Strengthened by her mother’s credo, ‘As long as there is life, there is hope’, and by the promise of a new love and a new life, Riva endures the long years of waiting for real freedom and a real home.
“Picking up where her acclaimed memoir The Cage leaves off, Ruth Minsky Sender has written another inspirational document of the power of hope and love over unspeakable cruelty.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/to-life-ruth-minsky-sender/1000487213?ean=9780689832826
Age Range: 12-15 years
Reading Level: AR Level – 4.6
Teacher’s Guide:
Siegal, A. (1981). Upon the head of a goat: A childhood in Hungary, 1939-1944. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Contributor biographical information http://www.loc.gov/catdir/bios/hol055/81012642.html
“Nine-year-old Piri describes the bewilderment of being a Jewish child during the 1939-1944 German occupation of her hometown (then in Hungary and now in the Ukraine) and relates the ordeal of trying to survive in the ghetto.”
summary from http://catalog2.loc.gov/vwebv/holdingsInfo?searchId=286479&recCount=25&recPointer=2&bibId=4679198
Honor Book, Newbery Award, 1982
Winner, Boston Globe – Horn Book Award, 1982
Age Range: 10-13 years
Reading Level: AR Level – 5.5; 830L
Teacher’s Guide:
(BookRags Lesson Plans) BN ID: 2940015644678
_____. (1985). Grace in the wilderness: After the liberation, 1945-1948. New York: Farrar, Strauss and Giroux.
Publisher description http://www.loc.gov/catdir/enhancements/fy0662/85020415-d.html
“Liberated from a German concentration camp at the end of World War II but haunted by the memory of her ordeal, fifteen-year-old Piri starts a strange new life as a Jew in Sweden. Sequel to Upon the Head of the Goat.”
summary from http://catalog2.loc.gov/vwebv/holdingsInfo?searchId=286479&recCount=25&recPointer=4&bibId=970559
Age Range: 13-17 years
Reading Level: AR Level – 5.9
Teacher’s Guide:
Silten, R. G. S.. (2004). Is the war over?: Memoir of a child survivor of the Holocaust. McKinleyville, CA: Fithian Press.
“Gabriele Silten spent much of her childhood in two Nazi concentration camps. Many of her friends and many members of her family were victims of the Holocaust. What she experienced should not have been experienced by any human being, let alone any child. Gabriele’s wartime years were vividly described in her first memoir, Between Two Worlds. According to history books, World War II ended in 1945, and those who had survived the ordeal of Nazi concentration camps were liberated, free to resume normal life again. What history books don’t tell us is that a trauma of that sort doesn’t just end. Perhaps no child survivor of the Holocaust has ever fully healed. Is the War Over? is a moving illustrated memoir that chronicles the years that followed young Gabriele's liberation from the camps, as she patched her life together again. Gabriele Silten now lives a fulfilling and productive life in Southern California, where she has enjoyed success as an academic and a writer. But the memories of her tortured childhood still haunt her. As the memoir illustrates, a person can recover, but no person can forget. Nor should she.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/is-the-war-over-r-gabriele-s-silten/1013616847?ean=9781564744296
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Śliwowska, W. (Ed.). (1998). The last eyewitnesses: Children of the Holocaust speak. (J. Bussgang & F. Bussgang, trans.). Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press.
Contributor biographical information http://www.loc.gov/catdir/enhancements/fy0645/97052099-b.html
Publisher description http://www.loc.gov/catdir/enhancements/fy0645/97052099-d.html
“These testimonies, submitted by individual authors and not originally intended for publication, were assembled as a historical record by the Association of the Children of the Holocaust in Poland. While evil and brutal anti-Semitism are described, the accounts also reveal the great risks taken by courageous individuals in order to save Jewish children.”
summary from http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/last-eyewitnesses-wiktoria-sliwowska/1115038246?ean=9780810115118
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide:
Suedfeld, P. (Ed.). (2001). Light from the ashes: Social science careers of young Holocaust refugees and survivors. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Publisher description http://www.loc.gov/catdir/description/umich051/00011815.html
“How did Nazi persecution affect the later lives of children and young adolescents? In Light from the Ashes, eighteen eminent social scientists trace the connection between their early wartime experiences and their adult research careers, personality, and values. Autobiographical essays describe their trauma of fleeing from or surviving the Holocaust during childhood or adolescence, and how this influenced their eventual choice of work and general outlook on life.
“The introductory and closing chapters set these narratives in historical and theoretical context and discuss their broader psychological and social implications. A unique feature of the book is that its contributors were children or adolescents when they became targets of Nazi persecution. Each chapter covers the contributor’s experiences during and after the war, his or her professional education, development, and activities, and the perceived connection between those factors. The wider impact of the early years on adult attitudes, political orientation, ethics, religion, family life, important values, and personality characteristics is also discussed.
“The book will be of primary interest to psychologists and to literary scholars interested in narrative and autobiography. It will be relevant to historians, sociologists, and philosophers of science, especially social science; and to scholars and researchers of all disciplines interested in the impact of traumatic violence, dislocation, war, persecution, and emigration (particularly, but not only, related to the Holocaust) on the subsequent lives of children and adolescents. It will also be valuable to psychologists, psychiatrists, and other scientists working in the field of stress and coping.
“For the general reader, the book offers the reminiscences of articulate and introspective people who as children experienced a wide variety of adverse circumstances and responded to them—then and later—in a wide variety of mostly adaptive ways. Readers intrigued by first-person narratives of war, persecution, and resilience will find the book of great interest."
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/light-from-the-ashes-peter-suedfeld/1112681636?ean=9780472067459
Age Range:
Reading Level:
Teacher’s Guide: