Thirteen year old Hannah Stern is a young Jewish girl, who travels back in time to 1942, during the time of the Holocaust. She's transported to a quiet, little, farm town in Poland. Hannah is addressed as, "Chaya," her Hebrew name, by two people. They are Gitl and Shmuel, Chaya's aunt and uncle. Hannah still has her memories of her time and family, but she's in Chaya's body. She's too confused to try to look around and figure out where she even is, so she is standing with them both speaking to her, things only Chaya would know. They spoke about her deceased parents, about how they passed away from a sickness going around the town she used to live in, Lublin. Confused and overwhelmed, Hannah was being hugged and shown emotions to. She was quickly sent off to bed by her aunt, who said she must be experiencing something from the sickness she is still recovering from. When she wakes up in the morning, she tries explaining frantically that she isn't from Poland, nor their time. They wouldn't listen and shook it off, yet again saying that it was the sickness. Hannah/Chaya will later on be taken to a concentration camp, along with a group of other people by Nazis. Hannah whimpers what she can remember from school about concentration camps, but no one will listen. She's forced through events, months in a concentration camp, trying not to get killed or hurt. Only the book will tell if she lives or not...
I think one of the themes in this book is really, don't take anything for granted. Whether it be your family, or your religion. Be proud of who you are, try to hear out what your family is speaking about. Understand what your family has been through, their suffering to get to where they are today, and all the suffering you might go through as well. The elders in your family are the wisest, listen to the life lessons they teach you, they'll get you far in life.
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