Dur­ing the uncer­tain and fright­en­ing buildup to World War II, Jew­ish gym­nast Agnes Keleti, the Hun­gar­i­an nation­al cham­pi­on, learned that she and oth­er Jew­ish gym­nasts would not be allowed to train or com­pete. She and a fel­low com­peti­tor decid­ed to con­tin­ue train­ing togeth­er in secret. When the Nazis marched into Budapest and start­ed round­ing up the Jews, she informed her fam­i­ly that they must go into hid­ing. After the war, she found out that her father had been killed in Auschwitz. She assem­bled those in her fam­i­ly who had sur­vived and, with great dif­fi­cul­ty, resumed her gym­nas­tic career, even­tu­al­ly becom­ing a respect­ed Olympic champion.

Agnes’s sto­ry is one of per­se­ver­ance, deter­mi­na­tion, and strength. Her life is an inspi­ra­tion, prov­ing that it is pos­si­ble to over­come tri­als and extreme hard­ships even in the most dif­fi­cult of times. This book will appeal to chil­dren who are inter­est­ed in Jew­ish his­to­ry or who need a reminder that their own goals are worth pur­su­ing, no mat­ter what.

An author’s note tells us more about Agnes, who even at the age of 101 trains every day. She cur­rent­ly lives in Israel.