Jes­si­ca Free­burg presents the Holo­caust to a new gen­er­a­tion by focus­ing on indi­vid­u­als who lived through the peri­od and inter­weav­ing their sto­ries to paint a pic­ture of the era, giv­ing a per­son­al touch to the his­to­ry rather than sim­ply a recita­tion of facts. This book is part of a series in which this tech­nique is used to elu­ci­date his­tor­i­cal events.

This method works well. Dates, places and dry text do not cap­ture the imag­i­na­tion as read­i­ly as char­ac­ters based on indi­vid­ual nar­ra­tive and choos­ing spe­cif­ic peo­ple to fol­low, some famous, oth­ers unknown, some hero­ic, oth­ers quite the oppo­site, is an effec­tive way to main­tain inter­est while pre­sent­ing his­to­ry smooth­ly and seam­less­ly. The book is writ­ten in easy-read­ing for­mat, mak­ing it a good choice for the more reluc­tant or less com­fort­able read­er and is use­ful both in and out of a class­room setting.

The text is accom­pa­nied by effec­tive­ly-pre­sent­ed black and white pho­tographs of the peri­od and is framed by a pro­logue which sets the his­tor­i­cal scene and an epi­logue which tells what hap­pened to the cho­sen indi­vid­u­als dur­ing and after the war. Well-cho­sen back mat­ter includes a time­line, a glos­sary, ques­tions to pro­mote crit­i­cal think­ing, inter­net sites, a sug­gest­ed read­ing list, a bib­li­og­ra­phy, and an index.

Rec­om­mend­ed for ages 5 – 10.