The story of Corrie ten Boom has inspired millions of people all over the world. Jean Watson is a skilful author and presents Corrie’s stirring life and challenging hope-filled message for young readers.
The Watchmaker’s Daughter traces the life of this outstanding Christian woman from her childhood in Haarlem, through her suffering in Nazi concentration camps, to her world-wide ministry to the handicapped and underprivileged.
This exciting victorious book will allow you to meet this beloved woman and learn of God’s wonderful provision and blessing through adversity.
What World is Left
A pampered child used to having her own way, Anneke Van Raalte lives outside Amsterdam, where her father is a cartoonist for the Amsterdam newspaper. Though Anneke’s family is Jewish, her religion means little to her. Anneke’s life changes in 1942 when the Nazis invade Holland, and she and her family are deported to Theresienstadt, a concentration camp in Czechoslovakia. Not only are conditions in the camp appalling, but the camp is the site of an elaborate hoax: the Nazis are determined to convince the world that Theresienstadt is an idyllic place and that European Jews are thriving under the Nazi regime. Because he is an artist, Anneke’s father is compelled to help in the propaganda campaign, and Anneke finds herself torn between her loyalty to her family and her sense of what is right. What World is Left was inspired by the experiences of the author’s mother, who was imprisoned in Theresienstadt during World War II.
Maus, I: A Survivor’s Tale: My Father Bleeds History (Maus #1)
Surviving Hitler: A Boy in the Nazi Death Camps
Award-winning author Andrea Warren presents a life-changing story of a young boy’s struggle for survival in a Nazi-run concentration camp. In this Robert F. Silbert Honor Book, narrated in the voice of Holocaust survivor Jack Mandelbaum, readers will glimpse the dark reality of life during the Holocaust, and how one boy made it out alive.
When twelve-year-old Jack Mandelbaum is separated from his family and shipped off to the Blechhammer concentration camp, his life becomes a never-ending nightmare. With minimal food to eat and harsh living conditions threatening his health, Jack manages to survive by thinking of his family.
Auschwitz: Inside the Nazi State
More than any previous documentary about the Holocaust, Auschwitz: Inside the Nazi State reveals the inner workings of the Nazi implementation of Hitler’s infamous “final solution.” Drawing on the latest academic discoveries, this remarkable BBC series presents a wide-ranging, meticulously researched biography of the titular “killing factory” and its evolution into a highly efficient location for industrialized extermination of well over one million Jews, gypsies, and other so-called “mongrel races” between 1940 and 1945. From “Surprising Beginnings” to “Liberation & Revenge,” the six-chapter program chronicles the gradual process that escalated into the Holocaust, focusing its expansive European timeline on the detailed movements of preeminent (and highly corruptible) Holocaust engineers like Heinrich Himmler, Rudolf Höss, and “death doctor” Josef Mengele. Through painstakingly authentic reenactments of crucial meetings including the Wannsee Conference (where the “final solution” was secretly devised), we see and hear the Nazi thought processes, built on virulent hatred and bigotry, that “justified” mass murder on an unprecedented scale.
Subtle but exacting use of computer-animated effects allows three-dimensional exploration of newly discovered architectural plans and buildings long-ago destroyed, revealing the transformation of Auschwitz as World War II progressed. Along with rare archival footage, thorough documentation, and frank testimony from Holocaust survivors and Nazi perpetrators (not all of them penitent about their crimes), these programs make expert use of commanding narration by Oscar®-winning actress Linda Hunt, who brings depth and gravitas to a grim litany of sobering facts and figures. The result is an all-encompassing portrait of Auschwitz unlike anything seen before, masterfully written and produced by Laurence Rees with equal parts tenacity, intelligence, and integrity, informed by an overriding sense of moral outrage that is entirely appropriate to the history being examined. It’s a remarkable achievement, as important as Shoah as a definitive exploration of one of the darkest chapters in human history. –Jeff Shannon
Search
Esther remembers her own experience of the Holocaust as a Jewish girl living in Amsterdam, and recounts to her grandson Daniel and his friend Jeroen how she escaped from the Nazis and survived by going into hiding in the countryside. Her parents were not so lucky. Esther knows they were sent to a concentration camp and died there, and with Daniel’s help she embarks on a search to discover what happened to them during the last months of their lives. After tracking down an old friend who now lives in Israel, Esther finally learns the shocking story of how her parents met their fates at Auschwitz.
No Pretty Pictures: A Child of War
The beloved Caldecott Honor artist now recounts a tale of vastly different kind — her own achingly potent memoir of a childhood of flight, imprisonment, and uncommon bravery in Nazi-occupied Poland. Anita Lobel was barely five when the war began and sixteen by the time she came to America from Sweden, where she had been sent to recover at the end of the war. This haunting book, illustrated with the author’s archival photographs, is the remarkable account of her life during those years. Poised, forthright, and always ready to embrace life, Anita Lobel is the main character in the most personal story she will ever tell.Anita Lobel was barely five years old when World War II began and the Nazis burst into her home in Krakow, Poland, changing her life forever. She spent the days of her childhood in hiding with her brother–who was disguised as a girl–and their Catholic nanny in the countryside, the ghetto, and finally in a convent where the Nazis caught up with her. She was imprisoned in a succession of concentration camps until the end of the war. Sent by the Red Cross to recuperate in Sweden, she slowly blossomed as she discovered books and language and art. Since coming to the United States as a teenager, Anita Lobel has spent her life making pictures. She has never gone back. She has never looked back. Until now.
Making Bombs for Hitler
In this companion book to the award-winning Stolen Child, a young girl is forced into slave labour in a munitions factory in Nazi Germany.
In Stolen Child, Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch introduced readers to Larissa, a victim of Hitler’s largely unknown Lebensborn program. In this companion novel, readers will learn the fate of Lida, her sister, who was also kidnapped by the Germans and forced into slave labour — an Osterbeiter.
In addition to her other tasks, Lida’s small hands make her the perfect candidate to handle delicate munitions work, so she is sent to a factory that makes bombs. The gruelling work and conditions leave her severely malnourished and emotionally traumatized, but overriding all of this is her concern and determination to find out what happened to her vulnerable younger sister.
With rumours of the Allies turning the tide in the war, Lida and her friends conspire to sabotage the bombs to help block the Nazis’ war effort. When her work camp is finally liberated, she is able to begin her search to learn the fate of her sister.
In this exceptional novel Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch delivers a powerful story of hope and courage in the face of incredible odds.
Keeping My Hope
KEEPING MY HOPE, a historical fiction graphic novel written by 14 year old Christopher Huh, talks about the life of a young teenage boy named Ari Kolodiejski, who is caught in the horrors of the Final Solution. Now as a parent and grandparent, he tells his life story to his grandchildren. After surviving the world’s most deadliest camp, he hopes to pass on his life legacy to his family.
Ari is a strong and courageous teen who must battle for his life throughout the second world war. Ari is forever scarred from his deep past. Despite being kept prisoner at the Auschwitz Birkenau concentration camp, seeing the untimely death of hundreds, and forced to endure unbearable conditions in lice infested clothing, Ari keeps his friends close and struggles to live. Throughout his stay in the camp, he meets two inmates who both stand along with him, trying to help as often as they can. Friendship and belief is all they have left, in which the Nazis and the war strip away from the trio and ultimately brings the devastating disaster that awaits. When Ari and his two friends are slowing down in a death march during a blizzard and his friend has frostbite, Ari still helps his friend despite an SS guard approaching them with a pistol. He even claims that “carrying Saul was a challenge” (page 149), but does not want to leave him in the snow, knowing the fate his friend would face.
He tries to help and aid his fellow camp inmates whenever possible. During his stay at Auschwitz III, everyone fears one Kapo guard who is known for being a sadist on the prisoners with a rubber truncheon. Ari not only stands up against the Kapo, he even goes to the point of scaring him too. The guard showed “in his eyes…he was confused, maybe even fearful. Almost as if he was the beaten victim” (page 104). No matter what consequences are to come, he always gives his best effort in order to make a situation better. Throwing himself into the line of fire while no one else would is the shocking reality that made those like Ari from ordinary people to heroes.
A true friend and strong Samaritan, Ari Kolodiejski is a person who is stuck with the ability to make anyone into being a friend with him. After his liberation of six years of terror, he tries to rebuild his life to replace the one he lost a lifetime ago. With his family’s history stored safely in the minds of his grandchildren, he can now preserve his memories for his great-grandchildren and their children to remember. KEEPING MY HOPE is an excellent book, and an even better one with the character of Ari.
Rose Under Fire (Code Name Verity #2)
While flying an Allied fighter plane from Paris to England, American ATA pilot and amateur poet, Rose Justice, is captured by the Nazis and sent to Ravensbrück, the notorious women’s concentration camp. Trapped in horrific circumstances, Rose finds hope in the impossible through the loyalty, bravery and friendship of her fellow prisoners. But will that be enough to endure the fate that’s in store for her?
Elizabeth Wein, author of the critically-acclaimed and best-selling Code Name Verity, delivers another stunning WWII thriller. The unforgettable story of Rose Justice is forged from heart-wrenching courage, resolve, and the slim, bright chance of survival.