Holocaust Remembrance Day, Lost Teeth, And More!

This fantastic picture book biography doesn’t release until March 23rd, but I had to include it here. Judith Geller/Jacqueline Gauthier was a Jewish member of the French Resistance. For five years during WWII, she posed as a non-Jewish social worker and visited Jewish homes with identity papers smuggled inside a wooden toy duck. She was able to save more than 200 lives. It’s a beautifully written biography, but just as moving is the author’s note in the back about connecting with Judith as a Jewish journalist with family killed during the Holocaust and the research she conducted to write this book.

Jella Lepman was a Jewish woman who fled Germany prior to WWII and returned afterward both to help rebuild the country and to share international books in a children’s books museum in the hopes of building “bridges of understanding.” This fictional picture book tells the story of two poor siblings who stumble upon Lepman’s museum and become enchanted with reading. This is a good companion to more discussions about the Holocaust and WWII.

Reminiscent of E.T.A. Hoffmann and Hans Christian Andersen, this middle grade fantasy depicts the horrors of the holocaust through the eyes of a doll, Karolina. Karolina’s doll world has been ravaged by rats, and when she escapes with a toy soldier named Fritz, a wind ferries them to our world and into the hands of two human magicians. Karolina’s magician is the dollmaker of Krakow, a kind-hearted and shy war veteran who makes toys. With Karolina’s help, he breaks out of his introverted shell and makes friends with a violinist and his daughter. Both are Jewish. When the Germans invade Krakow, a dark magic descends on their lives, reminding Karolina of when the rats invaded her homeland.