A Night Divided

This powerful book humanizes historical events by creating a story about people's struggle to live with autonomy and their efforts to live honorably in an unjust system. A NIGHT DIVIDED is fast-paced and simply written, and it moves the complex story along in an engaging way without getting bogged down in the history. Author Jennifer A. Nielsen weaves in the geopolitical factors that led to the creation of the Berlin Wall and shows why people had divided loyalties -- to Germany, Russia, their own city, and even at times their own families.

The result is an incredibly thoughtful, provocative, and very human look at a distant moment in history that will raise interesting questions for readers about what it means to be free and how we define the good life, all with a deeply nuanced understanding of what it means to do the "right" thing in complicated situations where not only political alliances but lives, futures, and happiness all are at stake. But even if you weren't interested in any of that, it still offers a fascinating, suspenseful tale of a thoughtful, courageous 12-year-old girl's determination to escape an oppressive life for something better.