From Berlin, 1938, and from Sach­sen­hausen work camp, 1940, and from mul­ti­ple cities and times in the Unit­ed States, we meet three dis­parate young peo­ple whose sto­ries are well worth read­ing. Dalya’s father’s shoe shop is destroyed dur­ing Kristall­nacht and then she watch­es her fam­i­ly die in a Nazi work camp. Ray, orphaned at birth, is a vic­tim of an unfor­tu­nate fos­ter care sys­tem. Pin­ny, a young girl with Down Syn­drome is aban­doned by her moth­er and left with noth­ing more than opti­mism and hope. A pair of shoes unites them. ​“Shoes are the keep­ers of secrets. They hold pieces of his­to­ry cap­tive in the soles,” the author com­ments in the pro­logue and this thought is woven through­out the plot with skill and cre­ativ­i­ty. The read­er sees Holo­caust sur­vivors who endure great suf­fer­ing but sees many oth­ers who have been pun­ished and den­i­grat­ed, both phys­i­cal­ly and emo­tion­al­ly by life, as well.

Por­tions of this book are so beau­ti­ful­ly writ­ten as to be unfor­get­table yet there are a num­ber of weak­ness­es which detract from its oth­er­wise high qual­i­ty; a mis­lead­ing title, sev­er­al com­ments made by char­ac­ters which don’t ring true to their age or stage of life, and a bit too much reliance on coin­ci­dence and hap­py endings. 

An author’s note with back­ground infor­ma­tion about the time peri­od is append­ed. Due to the graph­ic nature of some of the descrip­tions (Holo­caust, child abuse, fire, attempt­ed rape) this book is rec­om­mend­ed for ages 16 and up and may be an excel­lent choice for group discussion.