Is It Night or Day?

Can you imagine being sent away from the only small town you have ever known by yourself. . .away from your mother and father, your grandmother, your country, your native language at the age of twelve?

In this historical fiction piece written by the daughter of a woman who was sent away by her mother and father from Germany in 1938 to America, the reader learns the story of Edith Westerfeld. Edith's older sister Betty had been sent to America to live with a foster family two years before Edith was sent to live with her father's brother, Jacob and his wife Mildred and their only daughter Dorothy.

The author does an excellent job of helping us understand the many conflicting emotions that young Edith felt as she and some other children were ferried across the Atlantic Ocean to an entirely new culture and society--one is which they would always feel as though they are outsiders.

I have read a great deal of Holocaust literature, but this is the first title that dealt with the children who were saved from extermination by the Nazis by being sent by their parents to America. I thoroughly enjoyed reading about Edith's experience. If you enjoy learning about history by reading historical fiction, I believe you will also enjoy reading this book.