The Night Crossing

by Karen Ackerman

Paperback, 1995

Status

Available

Call number

J F ACK

Genres

Publication

Yearling (1995), Paperback, 64 pages

Description

In 1938, having begun to feel the persecution that all Jews are experiencing in their Austrian city, Clara and her family escape over the mountains into Switzerland.

Barcode

1952

Awards

Young Hoosier Book Award (Nominee — Intermediate — 1998)
Sydney Taylor Book Award (Mass Import -- Pending Differentiation)

Language

Lexile

960L

User reviews

LibraryThing member booo2893
-No Award
-3rd-4th
-This little girl named Clara escapes with her family to Switzerland during the Holocaust
-I would teach the kids the history of the Holocaust
-I would asked them what they would do if they were in the Holocaust and have them write their own diaries
LibraryThing member Thomasjmatthew
This is one book younger audiences will enjoy seeing as how there's a part in this short book where the youngest girl uses her quick wit to pull her whole family out of a jam. This shows that no matter how small one is, they are still very important.
LibraryThing member midkid88
This was a very quick read that can give a glimpse into what a family had to go through in order to get out of German occupied Austria. This can be used for a younger audience because the main character is a young girl who tells what is happening from her perspective, but the book also doen't get
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to detailed to give the younger audiences bad dreams.
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LibraryThing member kprinc3
I really liked The Night Crossing. I feel that this book presented the feelings of being a person of Jewish faith in Amsterdam during the Second World War without including details that would be too dark and frightening for children. The book focuses mostly on the youngest daughter, Clara. To me,
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this makes the book seem much more relatable to an elementary age audience because they are able to relate to the fears Clara might have about leaving her home behind. This 57 page chapter book is able to take readers on a journey of fear and suspense that ends happily for the family while still including factual information about the harsh realities many people were living during WWII. There are mentions of the sisters being chased home from school as their classmates shouted “Juden,” or Jew. The sisters also saw the town’s baker being taken away by Nazi’s for continuing to bake and sell kosher bread. During the story, Father is often seen consulting a map that has safe houses pointed out; these are places that escaping Jews could hide in exchange for money or other goods. At the end of the story, the family is living peacefully in England, but the narrator explains that Mother and Father have not heard from the extended family that was left in Amsterdam as the family crossed to Switzerland. The narrator also discusses the newspaper articles that revealed the torture of people at Nazi concentration camps. Overall, this book is an excellent representation of what historical fiction should look like when describing a dark time in history.
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ISBN

0679870407 / 9780679870401
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