Youth Destroyed: The Nazi Camps
Alice Lok was deported to Auschwitz, a Nazi death camp, in 1944. Upon her arrival, she faced a "selection." Alice had to stand in line as a Nazi doctor examined the new camp inmates. If the doctor pointed one direction, it meant hard labor, but labor meant life. If the doctor pointed the other way, that meant immediate death. Alice was lucky. She survived Auschwitz and two other camps. However, millions of Jews were not so lucky. There were six Nazi death camps in operation during World War II and thousands of other work and prison camps. Author Ann Byers details the stories of young people who were forced to live in Nazi camps during the Holocaust.
* Reviews *
Part of the True Stories of Teens in the Holocaust series, this book presents excerpts of firsthand accounts of youth in the Nazi camps, both the work camps and the death camps, intertwined into cohesive sections of the book. Separated into six chapters, Margaret Shannons Holocaust research brings out a wide range of voices from a variety of ages and geographic areas. The content is organized into the follwing areas—The Concentration Camps, Waiting Rooms, Worked to Death, The Death Camps, Auschwitz, and After the Camps and offers a chart of camp deaths. What makes this book unique is the plethora of voices presented—all from youths and teens. The student researcher will appreciate the time line, glossary, suggested further readings, Internet addresses, and index. The more advanced researcher will benefit from the many chapter bibliographic notes. Each chapter has subheadings to indicate how the excerpts from personal accounts are organized, with introductory and explanatory material. Although the suggested reading level is ages 8 to 12, older readers will benefit from the primary sources presented with explanations and introductions, either as a full resource or as a way to understand the lengthier resources mentioned in the chapter notes., Children's Literature