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What World is Left

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What World is Left

Paperback(2nd ed.)

$15.95

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Paperback(2nd ed.)
$15.95

View All Available Formats & Editions

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Overview

★ “Heartbreaking. An important addition to the Holocaust curriculum.”—Booklist, starred review

A pampered child used to having her own way, Anneke Van Raalte lives outside Amsterdam, where her father is a cartoonist for an Amsterdam newspaper. Though Anneke's family is Jewish, her religion means little to her. Anneke's life changes in 1942 when the Nazis invade Holland and she and her family are deported to Theresienstadt, a concentration camp in Czechoslovakia. Not only are conditions in the camp appalling, but the camp is the site of an elaborate hoax: the Nazis are determined to convince the world that Theresienstadt is an idyllic place and that European Jews are thriving under the Nazi regime. Because he is an artist, Anneke's father is compelled to help in the propaganda campaign, and Anneke finds herself torn between her loyalty to her family and her sense of what is right. What World is Left was inspired by the experiences of the author's mother, who was imprisoned in Theresienstadt during World War II.

The epub edition of this title is fully accessible.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781459833036
Publisher:	Orca Book Publishers
Publication date:	05/17/2022
Edition description:	2nd ed.
Pages:	240
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.25(h) x 0.62(d)
Age Range:	12 - 17 Years

About the Author

Monique Polak is the author of more than thirty books for young people. She is the three-time winner of the Quebec Writers' Federation Prize for Children's and YA Literature for her novels Hate Mail, What World is Left and Room for One More. In addition to teaching at Marianopolis College in Montreal, Monique is a freelance journalist whose work has appeared in Maclean's Magazine, the Montreal Gazette and other Postmedia newspapers. She is also a columnist on ICI Radio-Canada's Plus on est de fous, plus on lit! In 2016, Monique was the CBC/Quebec Writers' Federation inaugural writer-in-residence. Monique lives in Montreal.

Read an Excerpt

I scratch the skin around my shoulder. I know I mustn't, but I can't help it. I am itchy everywhere. I fight the urge to jump out of the bunk. Besides, there is no place to go. We are prisoners here. If only this was the dream and I could wake up and return to my old life.

From the B&N Reads Blog

Page 1 of

Editorial Reviews

"Intriguing and quite unique...The reader will undoubtedly find much to think about. I would recommend What World is Left to anyone interested in this often-overlooked piece of history."

What If? Magazine

"The pressure and urgency of inspiration, not to mention tears and blood, is palpable everywhere."

The Montreal Gazette

"The descriptive narrative is cohesive, well-constructed, and compelling and provides a different view of what a man deemed necessary to survive.

Tri State Young Adult Book Review Committee

★ "Heartbreaking. An important addition to the Holocaust curriculum."

starred review Booklist

"A very personal, thought-provoking and, ultimately, hopeful book."

The Jewish Independant

"The underlying truth of what happened and how her family survived is really what makes this utterly compelling fiction…I am so grateful to [Monique and other authors like her] who tackle these really difficult stories and write unflinching books for teenagers."

"All Points West," CBC Radio One - Nikki Tate

"Full of hope...This volume makes for great reading and an excellent resource for a school library."

Canadian Children's Book News

"An excellent novel—a great tale of overcoming adversity in a time of such dark despair."

TeensReadToo.com

"This book is well-written, the characters are developed so well you can relate to them, the setting is described such that you can picture it in your mind, and the action and suspense make you keep turning the pages."

YALSA YA Galley Teen Review

"Takes the reader to the heart of the horror by creating a character whose vivid confusion, disbelief, and innocence are immediate and powerful."

The Rover

"Recommended."

Tucson Unified School District

"A powerful story of growing up in unspeakable conditions, of human suffering, loss and, ultimately, hope."

The Chronicle Herald

"Through Anneke's eyes, author Monique Polak presents an astonishing and depressing event."

CM Magazine

"Polak's story breathes life into a period fading from memory."

Montreal Review of Books

"This book certainly holds its own in the canon of Holocaust-based fiction for the young adult audience...Polak balances this [dark reality] with uplifting moments of friendship, family tenderness and even romance."

Resource Links

"This well-written, painful story is a good addition to the genre of Holocaust fiction… Recommended."

Library Media Connection

"Through Anneke's eyes, author Monique Polak presents an astonishing and depressing event."

CM: Canadian Review of Materials

"An excellent novel—a great tale of overcoming adversity in a time of such dark despair."

TeensReadToo

"Polak's story breathes life into a period fading from memory."

Montreal Review of Books (MRB)

"Full of hope...This volume makes for great reading and an excellent resource for a school library."

Canadian Children's Book Centre (CCBC) Canadian Children’s Book News

"This book is well-written, the characters are developed so well you can relate to them, the setting is described such that you can picture it in your mind, and the action and suspense make you keep turning the pages."

Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA)

"The descriptive narrative is cohesive, well-constructed, and compelling and provides a different view of what a man deemed necessary to survive.

TriState Young Adult Book Review

2022-03-02
Anneke Van Raalte’s nonpracticing Dutch Jewish family is sent to Theresienstadt, a concentration camp that the Nazis try to pass off as a model settlement.
Fourteen in 1943, she lives through two years of scarce food, bedbugs, forced labor, and little privacy. Still, life here is preferential to being transported to death camps like Auschwitz, a fate suffered by many, including her best friend and the boy with whom she falls in love. Her family survives, but the Russian liberators and Dutch military are later suspicious: Did her father’s artistic work keep the family alive? Anneke struggles with these thoughts. She details the Nazis’ grandiose plans for the Embellishment, a facade created to fool the 1944 Danish Red Cross committee, which included her father’s fairy-tale murals in the children’s infirmary. In this first-person narrative, Anneke is keenly aware of the moral choices her father and other artists make even as they create clandestine drawings documenting their true plight. This novel, based on the author’s mother’s memories and a book by her maternal grandfather, cartoonist and illustrator Jo Spier, explores the situation of artists who were used by the Nazis to help cover up their heinous crimes. Originally published in 2008, this edition includes a new preface and references. Polak writes authentically, including appropriate details about the camp’s horrors and insights into her protagonist’s conflicted feelings about friendship, romance, family, and religion.
An unusual Holocaust novel told through the eyes of a cognizant, questioning teen. (author’s note, organizations) (Historical fiction. 12-16)

Kirkus Reviews

Anneke Van Raalte is 14 when the Germans deport her family from Holland and send them to Czechoslovakia-because they are Jewish. Despite constant hunger, severe crowding and other deprivations, Anneke, the narrator, is repeatedly told how lucky she is to be at the concentration camp Theresienstadt, which lacks gas chambers. Her father, formerly an illustrator for a Dutch newspaper, occupies an important position in the camp and can protect the family from the worst fate, being sent on a transport "east" (she eventually learns a transport almost invariably means death). But Anneke wonders at the justness of her father's behavior, particularly when he participates in the commandant's "embellishment" program, designed to trick the Danish Red Cross when it comes for an inspection-and, when that plan succeeds, to make a propaganda film. Polak (Scarred) bases Anneke's experiences on those of her mother's; while convincing generally, her writing shies from the extremities of camp existence. What it does offer is a candid look at a father's presumed collusion, a perspective rarely seen in YA literature about the Holocaust. Ages 12-up. (Oct.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Publishers Weekly

Gr 5-8
Forced to leave their privileged life in Holland, Anneke and her family are transported to the "model city" of Theresienstadt. Her father is a well-known painter/artist and is ordered to create much of the artwork for the pleasure of the Nazi officers in charge of this "unique" concentration camp. Anneke's forced labor in the kitchen is less brutal and harsh than some of the other assigned duties, and this once-spoiled 14-year-old learns that survival motivates any kind of work and conditions. But when her father begins to create a false series of signage and backdrop scenes to use as part of Hitler's documentary on the camp to falsely represent the "good" treatment and conditions of the Jews imprisoned there, Anneke has difficulty understanding his rationale. Her father's continual mantra is "the important thing is that we are together." As she watches the weekly transport orders of her companions to what she understands are the death camps, Anneke learns that sometimes placing one's ethics and values aside may be the only way to survive. Yet, once she discovers the artists' depictions of the camp's truly barbaric status, she develops a greater appreciation for her father's role. This often graphic and realistic novel, written in memoir format, raises questions of moral principles and beliefs while it portrays the horrors of the Holocaust.-Rita Soltan, Youth Services Consultant, West Bloomfield, MI

School Library Journal

[Starred review] "Heartbreaking. An important addition to the Holocaust curriculum."

Booklist

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Southwestern Ohio Young Adult Materials Review Group

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Manitoba Middle Years Association

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Jewish Book World