THE LIGHT OF DAYS (YOUNG READERS’ EDITION)

Lost stories of young Jewish female resistance fighters in World War II Poland are brought to light and retold for a new generation.

Young Jewish women played a critical role in resistance movements during World War II, yet they are rarely given due credit, their legacies largely neglected for myriad complex reasons. This book seeks to remedy that omission, highlighting the stories of just over a dozen such young women in Poland, based on primary and secondary sources, many created during wartime or in the immediate postwar era and subsequently lost to the annals of history. These courageous women, many of them active participants in Jewish youth group movements prior to the war, rallied their passions and their networks to build resistance movements within the Jewish ghettos. They gathered intelligence, helped organize uprisings, and participated in acts of sabotage. Those who could pass as non-Jews often served as couriers, smuggling information, goods, and people in and out of the ghettos. Initially it is difficult to keep track of the cast, with various individuals operating out of different locations, and the writing style is less than engaging. However, the pace picks up as readers become more intimately acquainted with a select few figures who especially stand out, such as Renia Kukiełka, a courier whose journey takes terrifying turns.

This valuable chronicle fills an important gap in Holocaust literature.