In Poland during the early part of the 20th, century mobs often stopped elderly, harmless Jews on the street, beating them up or smashing their shops. At any time, the Polish army might “take all men of fighting age away from their families, never to be seen again.” Abba and Pearl Goodstein decided in 1918 that they must leave Poland and head for America. Three years went by before Abba’s older sister, who had moved to America 14 years earlier, had finally collected all the documents they needed. Leaving most of their possessions and all of their money, they loaded everything they could under a false bottom in a hay wagon, tied their pet cow to it, and pretended to be farmers going to the fields. Abba hid under the pile of hay and ran and hid when they heard soldiers coming. Arriving in Plinsk in plenty of time to get the train to Danzig, where their ship was waiting, further miseries lay in store. Steerage has been described in many books, but never so clearly for this younger age group. But the family made it to America and eventually to Tennessee. Telling her family’s story, Schanzer draws pictures with words as well as with her art. Straightforward in execution, her illustrations convey the struggle without overloading the issues. On oversized pages, they alternate between two or three small vignettes and full-page spreads, sometimes stretching across two pages. Lots of white space for text and borders around the pictures adds an open feeling. Together, words and pictures present a frank and clear-cut introduction to Jewish immigration to America. (Picture book/nonfiction. 7-9)
Pub Date: Aug. 31, 2000
ISBN: 0-688-16989-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2000
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Strong rhythms and occasional full or partial rhymes give this account of P.T. Barnum’s 1884 elephant parade across the newly opened Brooklyn Bridge an incantatory tone. Catching a whiff of public concern about the new bridge’s sturdiness, Barnum seizes the moment: “’I will stage an event / that will calm every fear, erase every worry, / about that remarkable bridge. / My display will amuse, inform / and astound some. / Or else my name isn’t Barnum!’” Using a rich palette of glowing golds and browns, Roca imbues the pachyderms with a calm solidity, sending them ambling past equally solid-looking buildings and over a truly monumental bridge—which soars over a striped Big Top tent in the final scene. A stately rendition of the episode, less exuberant, but also less fictionalized, than Phil Bildner’s Twenty-One Elephants (2004), illustrated by LeUyen Pham. (author’s note, resource list) (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2005
ISBN: 0-618-44887-X
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2005
A clear, understandable account of a young Jewish boy's terrible experiences during the World War II. In 1944, when Eliezer Wiesel was 15, his town of Sighet (then part of Hungary) was invaded by the German army, who forced all the Jews to live in ghettos. From there, the Wiesel family were sent to concentration camps where, with the exception of Elie, they all were killed. Without fanfare but with dignified emphasis, author Pariser describes the cruelties and horrors of Wiesel's life as an inmate, as well as his subsequent liberation by Allied forces and his future vocation as a journalist, author, speaker, and political activist. Photographs from the WW II period establish a mood of somber witness. With its clear, narrative style, useful bibliography, chronology, and index, this is an excellent introduction to what is undeniably one of the darkest periods in modern history. (Nonfiction. 7-9)
Pub Date: Aug. 15, 1994
ISBN: 1-56294-419-3
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Millbrook
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1994
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