RISK, RESILIENCE, and REDEMPTION — Review & Giveaway

Thought for the Day:

“Your eloquence should be the servant of the ideas in your head. Your rule might be this: If a sentence, no matter how excellent, does not illuminate your subject in some new and useful way, scratch it out.”

~ Kurt Vonnegut ~

Gifts for My Writer Friends:

Fidgeting is a character trait that can carry a lot of water for you. HERE is a great little Narrative Nugget from Janice Hardy that can show you how.

Do you ever wonder which point of view is best for your story? HERE Barbara Josselsohn in Writer’s Digest writes about How to Choose the Best PoV in Fiction.

HERE is a great little post with wonderful writing advice — How Do I “Show, Don’t Tell” Emotions? from Deborah Halverson on the Dear editor.com site.

Home is the wayfarer, home from the sea. It was a good trip with lots of wonderful time with my daughter Maggie and my granddaughter, Gracie. I’ve discovered that I sleep better on a ship than any other place. I wish I had a rocker for my bed. If anyone knows where I can get a queen- or king-size cradle, let me know. We took a Norwegian Cruise Lines cruise from Quebec City to Boston, a cruise I have long wanted to take. We visited the Green Gables House on Prince Edward Island. It is the house that inspired the setting for Anne of Green Gables, and it has been furnished to show what a home in those days would have been. Lucy Maude Montgomery never lived there, but it was fun nonetheless. We visited a place called Peggy’s Cove in Nova Scotia, which was a beautiful seaside village that had the best lobster rolls I’ve ever had. A bus tour of Acadia National Park was the only other tour we did on the cruise. Wow. What a spectacularly beautiful place that is! I discovered Maggie and Gracie both love to do Karaoke, and it was a lot of fun for me to watch.

After we got off the ship in Boston, we drove to Concord and visited the Louisa May Alcott family home. It was really interesting to learn about her family and to learn more about her. I recommend it. As for the cruise, if you like ocean cruises, you probably would enjoy this one. I had forgotten how noisy ocean cruises are. I guess the cruise lines think if there is loud music everywhere all the time, people will think they are having fun. That said, it was quiet in our very nice, comfortable staterooms. The service was great, and the food was excellent and plentiful.

I was contacted not long ago by a publicist tasked with getting the word out about a new book for middle-graders about the holocaust. I think it is more important now than ever for youngsters to understand the dangers of living under an authoritarian government, so I said send me the book please. I will help get the word out. The full title is RISK, RESILIENCE, and REDEMPTION: A MIRACULOUS HOLOCAUST SURVIVAL STORY. It is written by Frank W. Baker, who is a journalist, educator, and media literacy expert. He tells the story of Felix Goldberg and Bluma Tishgarten Goldberg, both of whom survived the holocaust. Bluma and her sister Cela lived with their parents in a town in Poland when the German Nazis demanded all Jews wear yellow stars to identify them easily. The two girls were sent into the woods by their mother with what money and jewelry she had. The girls stayed hidden for weeks, but finally surrender to the Nazis when they are nearly starving. They are herded with others into old railroad cattle cars and taken to the Auschwitz concentration camp. They are forced to work in a munitions factory making bullets for the Nazi army. They are fed watery soup and a little hard bread. Later they are transferred to a different camp where conditions are even worse, and there they are forced to work painting Nazi airplanes. They do what they can to keep each other alive. Felix has also been captured by the Nazis while trying to escape. He is sent to work in a coal mine where many prisoners die every day. These three people somehow struggle through their terrible lives and manage to miraculously hang on until the camps are liberated by the Allied forces. All are sent to a displaced persons camp, and it is there Bluma and Felix meet and fall in love before moving to America to build a better life.

This is a story that emphasises hope and perseverance while showing some of the terrible conditions people had to survive. It is short, has a lot of illustrations, and the language is appropriate for a young audience. This will be a great book to put in the hands of reluctant readers. Youngsters will be engaged and will very likely want to know more. The Resources list in the back of the book will encourage readers to investigate more on their own.

I have a gently read paperback to give to one of you. All you need to do is be a follower (it’s free and easy — see the top, right corner of the post) with a US Address, and leave a comment. If you share the link to this post on social media, please let me know in your comment, and you will get an extra chance. And please don’t forget to check for other Marvelous Middle-Grade Monday posts at Greg Pattridge’s blog HERE.