Overview
Life is hard for all Jewish families like Rachel's in 1938 Warsaw. The whole family works to make ends meet and Rachel is often left alone in their basement apartment. Papa manages to bring her some paints and brushes and, because they have no paper, begins to paint flowers on the aparment's bleak walls. Despite the growing horrors outside, Rachel and her family find some relief in the bright flowers inside their home. Full color.Rachel, a young Jewish girl living in Nazi-occupied Warsaw, struggles to survive with her family and maintains hope by painting colorful flowers on her dingy apartment walls.
Editorials
Children's Literature -
Focusing on Rachel, an eight-year old Jewish girl, living in Warsaw, Poland in 1938, this is the moving, heartbreaking story of a family's sacrifices, fear and pain. Somber watercolors personalize the valiant struggle for beauty, sunshine and survival. This lengthy picture book may be the perfect choice for reluctant readers who find The Diary of Anne Frank or Number the Stars too difficult to read independently.School Library Journal
Gr 1-4-Nerlove describes the manifestations of the growing anti-Semitism Jewish people faced in Poland immediately preceding World War II. Rachel's father's dry goods store is forced to close, and he and his young son Nat become street porters. To ease her loneliness while her family works, Rachel paints pictures on her apartment wall. After the Nazis occupy Warsaw, the family is moved to the Warsaw ghetto and then deported to the concentration camp Treblinka. The book's conclusion is obtuse; readers cannot discern if any members of the family survived. An author's note provides only brief information, so adults will need to be prepared to discuss the fate of the main character, as well as provide some background about the war. Nerlove's watercolor illustrations are gentle and bright enough to temper the harshness of the subject. The book joins others that similarly explore highly personal incidents within the vast arena of World War II, such as Shulamith Oppenheim's The Lily Cupboard (HarperCollins, 1992); Ken Mochizuki's Baseball Saved Us (Lee & Low, 1993); and Yoshiko Uchida's The Bracelet (Philomel, 1993). Children will certainly be affected by this quiet, haunting book.-Ellen Fader, Multnomah County Library, Portland, ORHazel Rochman
Stories about the Holocaust for young children always raise problems: either they tell the terrifying truth and that can overwhelm this audience, or they distort the truth and make things sweet and hopeful. This quiet picture book is neither sensational nor comforting. Inspired by a pre-Holocaust photograph by Roman Vishniac, Nerlove imagines the life of a Jewish child in Warsaw who stayed in bed all winter because of the cold and painted flowers on the wall behind her bed. Most of the story takes place before the Nazi invasion, when the Jews suffered under Polish oppression. For a brief period, Rachel gets some shoes and even manages to go to school; then the Germans come, and the final double-page spread shows the Jews being taken to Treblinka concentration camp, Rachel's dreams "gone forever." The words and watercolor pictures are understated, avoiding close-up scenes of brutality, starvation, and breakdown. The focus is on the rooms of home and school and the brightly colored flowers that cover the cracked gray walls.Kirkus Reviews
Rachel, the Jewish heroine of this story, is trapped indoors, first by illness, then by the lack of shoes, and finally, by the invasion of Poland by the Germans in 1939.This story of persecution and poverty opens with Rachel's father still working at his store in Warsaw; soon, though, his business is taken over and he and his son, Nat, work as porters—jobs once delegated to horses. Rachel is forced to remain inside all winter, and through the small pleasures that break up the monotony of Rachel's ordeal—such as guessing whose feet are passing the basement apartment's only window—Nerlove (Thanksgiving, 1990, etc.) makes clear the pain of this exile. With a cast-off paint set, Rachel and her father paint flowers on the walls of their apartment; the dusky moss tones of the illustrations, echoing the somber tone of the text, come temporarily alive with the brightly petaled foliage that seems to herald more hopeful times. Then Rachel's family is ousted, first to the Warsaw ghetto and then to Treblinka. This strong, sad ending, despite the dire true story behind Rachel's circumstances (an old photo was Nerlove's inspiration), means that this book is best given to readers who already have a context for understanding it; that such horrors against humanity are treated with understatement makes them no less terrifying.