Chana Stiefel

First sentence: There once was a girl named Yaffa. She was a spirited girl who loved her home and her family. She was born in a shtetl, a small Jewish town that pulsed with love, laughter, and light. The name of her shtetl was Eishyshok (Ay-shi-shok). The family roots of the people in Eishyshok ran deep. For 900 years, their histories and spirits were woven into the fabric of the town.

Premise/plot: Nonfiction picture book and/or nonfiction picture book biography. I could see it being classified as either/both. The jacket copy says it is the biography of Yaffa Eliach the woman who created "the Tower of Faces" (aka The Tower of Life) at the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC. It is definitely the story of her life, her work, her life's work. But it is also so much more than that. It is the story of her community, and the story of the Holocaust as well.

My thoughts: I found this one FASCINATING. I really loved this nonfiction picture book. I loved learning the story behind The Tower of Faces. Though I'd not heard of this particular exhibit, I have heard of the Holocaust Memorial Museum. I would love to learn more about this exhibit and the others as well. I loved, loved, loved the photographs of this one.

I found it a powerfully compelling read. I'm not surprised a bit that it won the Sydney Taylor Book Award. (It was also a Robert F. Sibert Honor book).… (mehr)

Yaffa was born in the Jewish shtetl of Eishyshok, Poland, a town with a 900-year history. That history was wiped out when Germans invaded ("darkness came to Eishyshok"). Six-year-old Yaffa escaped with her family and a few photographs; they hid throughout the war, and afterward, Yaffa built a life in Jerusalem and then America. Later, she helped create an exhibit at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, a years-long project that involved collecting photographs that former residents of Eishyshok had sent to relatives elsewhere. "Yaffa decided she would find the survivors and rebuid Eishyshok, not brick by brick, but photograph by photograph, story by story." Illustrated versions of the photographs are included on several pages, and a dramatic 90-degree page turn shows a vertical spread of the "tower of life," a three-story-high exhibit of over 1,000 photos.

A deeply impactful story, and an important one for a generation who will not know living Holocaust survivors.

Back matter: timeline ("a snapshot of Yaffa's life and legacy"), bibliography, further reading for children, author's note ("every person, a world")… (mehr)