A child's perspective...
Like every grandmother, Dounia was once a little girl herself.
Tonight, she's finally ready to tell her granddaughter a secret about her childhood -- something she never even told her son.
Tonight, Dounia is ready to share her memories of Paris in 1942. Memories of wearing a Star of David, of living in fear, of the kindness of strangers.
Memories of being hidden.
-- from the book jacket
In this graphic novel, a grandmother tells her granddaughter about her experience during the holocaust. Dounia (the grandmother) was kept hidden from the Germans by various people who kept her safe. Dounia's parents were taken and she was alone, but the people who helped her did their best to make her feel secure. Dounia expresses her fear, sadness, anger and hope through the words and the images.
Because this is a graphic novel, the images are very important to the story. And the images are beautiful. The expressions on the characters faces convey strong feelings, even when there are no words. And in the end, when Dounia sees someone who survived one of the camps, the image captures what survivors looked like and we can completely understand when Dounia says she doesn't even recognize the person.
A great story with beautiful pictures that may make it easier to convey to kids what it felt like to be a jewish child during this time.
Recommended to:
Good for parents who want to help their kids understand this time in history. And for 4th through 8th graders to read on their own.
