Four Perfect Pebbles: A Holocaust Story

by Lila Perl

Paperback, 1997

Status

Available

Call number

J 940.53 PER

Publication

Scholastic Inc, Paperback

Description

Biography & Autobiography. History. Juvenile Nonfiction. Religion & Spirituality. HTML: The twentieth-anniversary edition of Marion Blumenthal Lazan's acclaimed Holocaust memoir features new material by the author, a reading group guide, a map, and additional photographs. "The writing is direct, devastating, with no rhetoric or exploitation. The truth is in what's said and in what is left out."â??ALA Booklist (starred review) Marion Blumenthal Lazan's unforgettable and acclaimed memoir recalls the devastating years that shaped her childhood. Following Hitler's rise to power, the Blumenthal familyâ??father, mother, Marion, and her brother, Albertâ??were trapped in Nazi Germany. They managed eventually to get to Holland, but soon thereafter it was occupied by the Nazis. For the next six and a half years the Blumenthals were forced to live in refugee, transit, and prison camps, including Westerbork in Holland and Bergen-Belsen in Germany, before finally making it to the United States. Their story is one of horror and hardship, but it is also a story of courage, hope, and the will to survive. Four Perfect Pebbles features forty archival photographs, including several new to this edition, an epilogue, a bibliography, a map, a reading group guide, an index, and a new afterword by the author. First published in 1996, the book was an ALA Notable Book, an ALA Quick Pick for Reluctant Readers, and IRA Young Adults' Choice, and a Notable Trade Book in the Field of Social Studies, and the recipient of many other honors. "A harrowing and often moving account."â??School Library… (more)

Barcode

822

Awards

Language

User reviews

LibraryThing member Whisper1
This is a story of frustrating missed opportunities. This is a story of hope. This is a story of courage.

Told in simplistic detail, the story contains the Blumenthal family of four who are moved on Hitler's chess board, forward, backward, sideways, down hill, uphill, on trains, in camps, with hope,
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with little hope, with denial and then with realization that to be stuck in Germany when your life is meaningless to the master holding the rule book equates to a harrowing game that you never agreed to play.

The author tells the tale of the Blumenthal journey that lasted six and 1/2 terrifying years.

Trapped in Hitler's Germany, the Blumenthal family were temporarily lucky to flee to Holland, but shortly thereafter that country was not safe. Through a series of unfortunate missed opportunities, they were sent to various refugee camps, and then back to Germany to Bergen Belsen. Six days before the British troops liberated Bergen-Belsen, the Blumenthals were transported like cattle to another location. Riding the typhus infested death train for two weeks, eventually they were liberated by Russian troops.

At the beginning of the Nazi occupation young Marion Blumenthal collected three perfect pebbles, superstitiously she believed if she found the fourth it would be a sign that their four family members would survive. Alas, Marion never found the fourth pebble.
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LibraryThing member richardderus
In the annals of man's cruelty to man, the Holocaust stands out for its sheer, industrial-scale coldness and horror. There is ample literature attesting to the awfulness of being condemned to death for the mere accident of being born to a Jewish parent. This book, another entry into that corwded
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segment, is aimed at young readers.

I don't know that any book about the Holocaust is something I want young readers to read. It's too huge and too vile a topic to make me feel comfortable introducing it to those whose lives are still in the vulnerable and bendable stage. I wouldn't let my child read this book, far better she should read the Marquis de Sade than this kind of material.

But the world disagrees with me. So I am renewedly glad that I have no young children. But I think this story is one that makes the idea of the Holocaust, its especial and unique evil in human history, more painfully poignantly real than any other literary work I've ever seen: This is the story of a child who went through the system with her family intact, until the bitter horrifying end of the tale. This is what the horrible, vile, evil, disgusting Germans wanted to destroy: A little girl, her mama, her papa, and her big brother.

Because they were Jews.
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LibraryThing member JanaRose1
Marion was almost five years old when her family fled Germany for Holland. Despite the visas and tickets they had to immigrate to the United States, they were unable to leave Europe once the Germans invaded Holland. They then made arrangements to be part of a group immigrating to Palestine however,
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they were sent instead to Bergen-Belsen in the “family camp.” The family is able to stay together until her father dies of typhus several months after liberation.

I found this book a bit lackluster. The story alternates from Marion’s point of view and third person. Such intertwining of narration and first-person voice makes the story a bit bland and unemotional. Overall, this book lacks the intensity of other holocaust books.
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LibraryThing member ithilwyn
A story of a little girl's survival. She also goes into what life was like after the war.
LibraryThing member LibrarysCat
This Holocaust narrative provides one family's experiences during WWII. Written in simple, but compleling, language, the author relates the horrors that she witnessed as her family was sent to the death camps and death trains. Aimed at young readers, the book contains very disturbing pictures which
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further highlight the author's recollections. However, occassionally the simplicity of the story seems to jump over parts of the history.
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LibraryThing member Folkshul
Memoir of the Holocaust
LibraryThing member TFS93
Heartwrenching! This one is perfect for younger children, it doesn't sugarcoat, but it also doesn't give graphic detail, so kids can think and draw their own conclusions about how horrible the Holocaust was without being too sickened to want to read the story. A wonderful tale of survival and never
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giving up even when many obstacles are thrown in your path. A tale of family love that will make you appreciate what you have even more!
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LibraryThing member rgruberexcel
RGG: Concise, compelling telling of one Jewish family's efforts to escape Nazi Germany and emigrate to America, and who survive Westerbork and Bergen-Belsen concentration camps.
LibraryThing member Bergenfield_Library
130 pages. AR Quiz # 58893. 7.3BL. 4.0 points. Bergenfield Library owns one copy (J. 940.5318 Per). BCCLS owns approximately 20 copies.
LibraryThing member wichitafriendsschool
The six-year ordeal of the Blumenthal family is chronicled in this memoir of Jewish life during the Holocaust from a little girl's perspective.
LibraryThing member smorton11
Marion describes her story as the one that Anne Frank might have told had she survived past March 1945. Both Anne and Marion spent time in Westerbork and later Bergen-Belsen. Of the 120,000 Jews detained in Westerbork, 102,000 perished before the end of World War II, 18,000 survived. Anne fell into
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the former group, Marion, the latter. While Anne’s story is typically read by pre-teens and early teenagers in the world today, Marion’s serves as an introduction for those who are just starting to ask their parents and teachers how people can be so mean and intolerant of one another.

In a society that is quickly becoming more divided and more intolerant, Marion’s message of hope, faith, and family strength, is even more important than it was when she first started discussing her experiences a couple decades ago. While most may brush off the striking similarities to the current president’s rise to power and the Nazis, it is hard for those who truly know their history to ignore. It is even harder for those who know that atrocities of WWII still ring loud in their older generation’s ears, and yet their younger generations engage in racist and destructive behavior.

Marion’s story is one of compassion and hope during one of the world’s worst times. My only reason for giving a less than superb rating is that brevity of the book. While written with young children (9-11 years old) in mind, there is only so much that one can remember about those years themselves, particularly 50 years later, as was the case when Marion & Lila wrote Four Perfect Pebbles and Marion recounted her childhood to Lila. Everyone always wants more from a good book, but at 160 pages, Four Perfect Pebbles is incredible concise.
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ISBN

0590381962 / 9780590381963
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