Boy from Buchenwald: The True Story of a Holocaust Survivor

One of 427 boys transported by a Jewish children’s relief agency to France from the Nazi concentration camp Buchenwald in Weimar, Germany, Polish-Canadian humanitarian Waisman recounts his harrowing youth during and immediately following WWII. Waisman’s early childhood in a loving family living in a shtetl in south-central Poland was destroyed by the 1939 Nazi invasion, as he and his family and were moved to a Jewish Quarter in 1941. Forced to become a child laborer in a German munitions factory, Waisman was eventually taken by cattle car to Buchenwald. The primary narrative focuses on his experiences following the 1945 liberation of Buchenwald, but frequently flashes back to the years in the camp as well as to his time working in the factory, watching sick and weak workers being killed, and to memories of his prewar childhood. Frequent shifts in time and place can be confusing, and though his descriptions of his Buchenwald companion Elie Wiesel prove intriguing, the number of significant characters can be difficult to track. But Waisman’s resistance to—and eventual acceptance of—help and healing makes for a compelling story of recovery from extreme trauma. Ages 9 –11. [em](May) [/em]