HOLOCAUST-RELATED WAR EXPERIENCES ( 1939 - 1945) IN LITERATURE
Occupation - - Resistance - - Escape
- Ackerman, Karen. The Night Crossing. In 1938, having begun to feel the persecution that all Jews were experiencing in their Austrian city, Clara and her family escape over the mountains into Switzerland.
- Adler, David. Child of the Warsaw Ghetto . NY: Holiday House, 1995. The story of the Warsaw Ghetto told through the eyes of Froim Baum, who was born in Warsaw on April 15,1936. Placed in orphanage after father died. Taken to death camps. Survivor of Dachau.
- Adler, David. Hilde and Eli: Children of the Holocaust .NY:Holiday House, 1994. 32 ps. Hilde Rosenzweig loved to ride her tricycle and play with dolls; Eli Lax studied hard in school and loved animals. This picture book biography presents their stories for read-aloud or independent reading.
- Adler, David. A Picture Book of Anne Frank . NY: Holiday House, 32 ps. A chronicle of the life of Anne Frank, a young Jewish girl, who kept a diary during her family's attempts to hide fromthe Nazis inthe 1940s. Important dates in the life of Anne Frank and notes fromthe author are included.
- Drucker, Malka and Halperin, Michael. Jacob's Rescue: A Holocaust Story . NY: Yearling, 1993. (117 ps.) Once Jacob Gutgeld lived with his family ina beautiful house in Warsaw, Poland. Everything was fine until the day the Nazi soldiers invaded in 1939. It was not safe to be Jewish. Jacob sliped through a hole inthe ghetto wall and lived, unnoticed with Alex Roslan's family who were Christian.
- Frank, Anne. Diary of a Young Girl. The Frank family is hidden away by friends on the top floor of a building in Amsterdam during the German occupation from 1942-1944.
- Greenfield, Howard. The Hidden Children . Ticknor & Fields, 1993. 128 ps. This compelling book details the recollections of thirteen hidden Jewish children during the Holocaust. It introduces the plight of European Jewry during World War II at a level that young readers can understand.
- Herman, Erwin and Agnes. The Yanov Torah . MD: Kar-Ben Copies, 1985. Jews in a work camp in Yanov during the Nazi occupaton of L'vov, Poland, smuggle in a Torah, piece by piece, despite enormous personal danger.
- Hesse, Karen. Letters from Rifka . NY: Trumpet, 1992. (147 ps) Lucy Avrutin's story of life in Russia with the pogroms around WW I and her arrival to the United States.
- Kerr, Judith. When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit . A 9-year-old Jewish refugee, Anna, and her brother escape from Germany to Switzerland, next to Paris, and finally to London in the 1930s facing school, home, family, religious, and self changes along the way.
- Lakin, Patricia. Don't Forget . Tambourine Books, 1994. 32 ps. As Sarah sets off to buy the ingredients for a surprise birthday cake for her mother, all the shopkeepers in Roxbury, Mass. give her advice. But the Singers, who are Holocause survivors, share with Sarah the most important secret of all. (VLF/3)
- Levitin, Sonia. Journey to America . The Platts watch Hitler gain in power. In 1938, Mr. Platt leaves for America. His family leaves on a "vacation" for Switzerland and plan to escape to America too.
- Lowry, Lois. Number the Stars . In 1943, during the German occupation of Denmark, 10-year-old Annemarie learns how to be brave and courageous when she helps shelter her Jewish friend from the Nazis.
- Matas, Carol. Daniel's Story . NY: Scholastic, 144 ps. (YA Paper - oversize) Daniel describes his family's suffering as the Nazis rise to power in Germany, his imprisonment ina concentrations camp, and his liberations. This is a story about hope, life, and love in the midst of terrible despair. (Published in conjunction with the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum) Glossary. Chronology.
- Oppenheim, Shulamith Levey. The Lily Cupboard. Miriam, a young Jewish girl, is forced to leave her parents and hide with strangers in the country during the German occupation of Holland.
- Reiss, Johanna. The Upstairs Room . Mrs. Reiss' illness causes her family to remain in Holland when the Germans attack in World War II.
- Richter, Hans. Freidrich. Friedrich Schneider, a German Jew in 1925, remains friends with his best frined, a Gentile boy of his own age, though Hitler rises to power and blocks Friedrich's life . . dead at 17.
- Sachs, Marilyn. A Pocket Full of Seeds. A young Jewish girl living in France during the German occupation is very aware of the realities of war.
- Schur, Steven. The Shadow Children. NY: Morrow, 96 ps. While spending the summer on his grandfather's farm in the French countryside, 11-year-old Etiene discovers a secret going back to World War II and encounters the ghosts of Jewish children who suffered a dreadful fate under the Nazi power.
- Suhl, Yuri. Uncle Misha's Partisans. Motele's entire Ukranian village was massacred by the Germans in World War II. He met two partisans and became recruited as a guerrila fighter. He is given dangerous assignments against the Nazis.
- Toll, Nelly. Behind the Secret Window: a Memoir of a Hidden Childhood During World War Two. NY: Dial Books for Young Readers, 160 ps. Along with her mother, eight-year-old Nelly Tollsurvived the Nazi occupation of Poland. By combining her childhood diary and watercolor pictures, the autheor has created a remarkable autobiography. Her powerful prose tells a story that is filled with courage and hope.
- Van der Rol, Ruud. Anne Frank: Beyond the Diary. Viking, 113 ps. A photo-biography that includes interviews with those who knew Anne, as well as historical essays that give insights into that period.
WORLD WAR II EXPERIENCES WITH VARIED SETTINGS
- DeJong, Meindert. The House of Sixty Fathers. In China, Tien Pao and his pet pig are separated from his family and must face hunger, terror, and pain while trying to rejoin them.
- Haar, Jaap Ter. Boris. During the siege of Leningrad, Russia in World War II, Boris, his mother, and Nadia, his friend, try to survive the German patrols, the lack of food, hoping possibly to escape.
- Haugaard, Erik. Little Fishes. In Italy, Guido, a 12-year-old beggar in war-torn Naples, shows how World War II affects children as he, Anna, and Mario are on-the-road.
- McSwigan, Marie. Snow Treasure. In Norway, a ground of children fool German guards during World War II while helping to smuggle gold from their country.
- Uchida, Yoshiko. Journey to Topaz. In America during World War II, a Japanese-American family faces problems when Japanese people were placed in American internment camps.
- Taylor, Theodore. The Cay. During World War II in Curacao, Phillip finds himself shipwrecked on a deserted island with Timothy after a German U-boat torpedoes the ship taking Phillip back to America.
- Uchida, Yoshiko. Journey Home. (sequel to Journey to Topaz) 12-year-old Yuki and her parents are released from an American internment camp for American-born Japanese (Nisei-citizens). They return to Berkeley, California to make do with what is left. Facing anti-Japanese violence and the return from the American armed forces of her wounded brother, the family and Yuki go on.
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