One woman's moving story of her journey with her mother to find their past and the tragedy that haunts it
In 1937, Edith Westerfeld's parents--before being killed by the Nazis--sent her from Germany to live with relatives in America. Fifty-four years later, Edith decided that it was time to, with her grown daughter Fern, revisit the town she had left so many years before. For Edith the trip was a chance to reconnect and reconcile with her past; for Fern it was a chance to learn what lay behind her mother's silent grief. On their journey, Fern and her mother shared many extraordinary encounters with the townspeople and--more importantly--with one another, closing the divide that had long stood between them.

Motherland: Beyond the Holocaust: A Mother-Daughter Journey to Reclaim the Past

Biographies & Memoirs

Chapman, Fern Schumer

Regional U.S.

Penguin Publishing Group

It's 1938, and twelve-year-old Edith is about to move from the tiny German village she's lived in all her life to a place that seems as foreign as the moon: Chicago, Illinois. And she will be doing it alone. This dramatic and chilling novel about one girl's escape from Hitler's Germany was inspired by the experiences of the author's mother, one of twelve hundred children rescued by Americans as part of the One Thousand Children project.
This title has Common Core connections.
Is It Night or Day? is a 2011 Bank Street - Best Children's Book of the Year.

Is It Night or Day?: A Novel of Immigration and Survival, 1938-1942

Teen & Young Adult

Historical Fiction

Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)

A moving memoir of the motherdaughter relationship follows Edithwho as a girl was sent by her GermanJewish parents to live with relatives in Chicagoas she returns to the country of her birth after the war to face the murder of her entire family. 17,500 first printing.

Motherland: A Daughter's Journey to Reclaim Her Past

Viking Adult

Picture book explaining why a grandmother cannot visit her granddaughter during the Coronavirus

Happy Harper Thursdays: A Grandmother's Love for Her Granddaughter during the Coronavirus

Children's Books

Growing Up & Facts of Life

Gussie Rose Press

It's 1938, and twelve-year-old Edith is about to move from the tiny German village she's lived in all her life to a place that seems as foreign as the moon: Chicago, Illinois. And she will be doing it alone. This dramatic and chilling novel about one girl's escape from Hitler's Germany was inspired by the experiences of the author's mother, one of twelve hundred children rescued by Americans as part of the One Thousand Children project.
This title has Common Core connections.
Is It Night or Day? is a 2011 Bank Street Best Children's Book of the Year.

Literature & Fiction

Square Fish

Is It Night or Day?: A True Story of a Jewish Child Fleeing the Holocaust

Updated edition with new Author's Note!How could we leave the only world we had ever known? Parents, brothers, sisters, grandparents, aunts and uncles, and cousins - all were holding hands, clinging to one another, as if they'd never let go.A story that is more relevant than ever, as parents in our war-torn world are forced to rip their families apart and send their children away to safety.It's 1938, and twelve-year-old Edith is about to move from the tiny German village she's lived in all her life to a place that seems as foreign as the moon: Chicago, Illinois. And she will be doing it alone. This dramatic and chilling novel about one girl's escape from Hitler's Germany was inspired by the experiences of the author's mother, one of fourteen hundred children rescued by Americans as part of the One Thousand Children project.BONUS MATERIALS INSIDE! Features a discussion guide, Q&A with the author, and a special look at the remarkable true story as seen on the Oprah network, OWN.

Social Issues

The Sibling Estrangement Journal: A guided exploration of your experience through writing

Self-Help

Relationships

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Books by Chapman, Fern Schumer