ELISABETH

A simple true reminiscence about the disruption of war and the almost unfathomable reunion that mends a woman's heart many years after it's broken. The story opens on the eve of WW II in Germany, where the little girl (the author's mother, Ruth) lives with her family in secure surroundings. Her most beloved possession is a doll named Elisabeth. ``The sun shone down on both of us and together we cast one shadow.'' When the family flees the Nazis, the girl can take nothing with her, not even Elisabeth. Years later, when the girl is grown and living in America, her six-year-old daughter asks for a doll that will ``fill her arms like a real baby.'' The mother is drawn to a doll in an antique-store window and discovers that the doll is her own long-lost Elisabeth. Told in lyrical prose and illustrated in a muted palette with accents of bright color, this conveys the warmth and love of home and family, surviving across generations. (Picture book. 4-8)