Jewish American Heritage Month - Great Books for TeensLike this list

28 items

• The Girl Who Sang

  a Holocaust Memoir of Hope and Survival

  Nadel, Estelle,

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  A heartrending graphic memoir about a young Jewish girl's fight for survival in Nazi occupied Poland, The Girl Who Sang illustrates the power of a brother's love, the kindness of strangers, and finding hope when facing the unimaginable.

• Trajectory

  Gordon, Cambria,

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  As the United States enters World War II, seventeen-year-old Eleanor wants to do something to help her Jewish relatives in Poland, so she puts her brilliant math skills to work for the US army to fine-tune a top-secret weapon that will help defeat…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Song of a Blackbird

  Van Lieshout, Maria,

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  In 1943 Amsterdam, Emma Bergsma's world changes when she witnesses Jewish families being forcibly deported to concentration camps. That pivotal moment lights a fire within her, and she decides to join the Dutch Resistance. Before long, Emma is drawn…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• It's a Whole Spiel

  Love, Latkes, and Other Jewish Stories

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  From stories of confronting their relationships with Judaism to rom-coms with a side of bagels and lox, It's a Whole Spiel features one story after another that says yes, we are Jewish, but we are also queer, and disabled, and creative, and…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Prisoner B-3087

  Gratz, Alan, 1972-,

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  Based on the astonishing true story of Ruth and Jack Gruener, this gripping novel follows a young Jewish boy from Poland who is forced from one nightmarish concentration camp to another, as World War II rages all around him.

• The Life and Crimes of Hoodie Rosen

  Blum, Isaac,

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  Hoodie Rosen's life isn't that bad. Sure, his entire Orthodox Jewish community has just picked up and moved to the quiet, mostly non-Jewish town of Tregaron, but Hoodie's world hasn't changed that much. He's got basketball to play, studies to avoid,…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Courage to Dream

  Tales of Hope in the Holocaust : a Graphic Novel

  Shusterman, Neal,

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  Courage to Dream plunges readers into the darkest time of human history-the Holocaust. This graphic novel explores one of the greatest atrocities in modern memory, delving into the core of what it means to face the extinction of everything and…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• The Way Back

  Savit, Gavriel,

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  For the Jews of Eastern Europe, demons are everywhere: dancing on the rooftops in the darkness of midnight, congregating in the trees, harrowing the dead, even reaching out to try and steal away the living. But the demons have a land of their own: a…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Eyes of the World

  Robert Capa, Gerda Taro, and the Invention of Modern Photojournalism

  Aronson, Marc,

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  Examines the lives and careers of -Robert Capa and Gerda Taro, [who] were young Jewish refugees, idealistic and in love. As photographers in the 1930s, they set off to capture their generation's most important struggle--the fight against fascism.…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• In the Neighborhood of True

  Carlton, Susan Kaplan,

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  In the very white, very Christian world of 1958 Atlanta, New York transplant Ruth decides not to tell her new high-school friends and boyfriend that she is Jewish. But when a violent act rocks the city, Ruth must figure out where her loyalties lie…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Crying Laughing

  Rubin, Lance, 1981-

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  Winnie Friedman has been waiting for the world to catch on to what she already knows: she's hilarious. It might be a long wait, though. After bombing a stand-up set at her own bat mitzvah, Winnie has kept her jokes to herself. Well, to herself and…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• The Assignment

  Wiemer, Liza

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  Standing in opposition to a class assignment to debate Hitler's Final Solution, seniors Cade and Logan become embroiled in turmoil involving their teacher, principal, Commissioner of Education, white supremacists, and their entire community.

• The Ghosts of Rose Hill

  Romero, R. M. (Rachael Maria), 1987-

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  Sent to stay with her aunt in Prague and witness the humble life of an artist, Ilana Lopez--a biracial Jewish girl--finds herself torn between her dream of becoming a violinist and her immigrant parents' desire for her to pursue a more stable…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Those Summer Nights

  Silverman, Laura,

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  After recovering from a soccer injury that ended her Olympic dreams and still grieving the death of her beloved grandmother, seventeen-year-old Hannah Klein must navigate a new summer job working with her ex-best friend, her younger brother, and her…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• When the Angels Left the Old Country

  Lamb, Sacha,

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  Uriel the angel and Little Ash (short for Ashmedai) are the only two supernatural creatures in their shtetl (which is so tiny, it doesn't have a name other than Shetl). The angel and the demon have been studying together for centuries, but pogroms…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Going Bicoastal

  Adler, Dahlia,

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  A romantic Sliding Doors bi YA that explores the idea that there's more than one path toward the right destination, where a girl must decide whether she stays in NYC with her dad (and gets with the girl she's been crushing on forever) or goes to LA…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• From Dust, a Flame

  Podos, Rebecca,

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  On her seventeenth birthday, Hannah Williams begins exhibiting impossible, temporary mutations--gills one day and horns the next--that are the consequences of a desperate bargain her mother made with a sheyd decades ago, and to break the family…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Impossible Escape

  a True Story of Survival and Heroism in Nazi Europe

  Sheinkin, Steve,

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  From award-winning author Steve Sheinkin, a true story of two Jewish teenagers racing against time during the Holocaust-one in hiding in Hungary, and the other in Auschwitz, plotting escape.

• Night

  Wiesel, Elie, 1928-2016

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  Night offers much more than a litany of the daily terrors, everyday perversions, and rampant sadism at Auschwitz and Buchenwald; it also eloquently addresses many of the philosophical as well as personal questions implicit in any serious…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• You Belong Here

  Miller, Sara Phoebe,

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  It's the first day of senior year and seventeen-year-old Essie Rosen is already over it. Her best friend went off to college and barely responds to her texts, her brother's on the other side of the country in rehab, every conversation with her mom…Read moreRead more of this annotation