Sydney Taylor Book Award

A multicultural family celebrates the traditions of two New Years--the Jewish Rosh Hashanah in the autumn, and the Asian Lunar New Year several months later.

Frederieke Teitler and her older sister, Astra, live in a house, in a city, in a world divided. Their father ran out on them when Rieke was only six, leaving their mother a wreck and their grandfather as their only stable family. He’s done his best to provide for them and shield them from antisemitism, but now, seven years later, being a Jew has become increasingly dangerous, even in their beloved home of Czernowitz, long considered a safe haven for Jewish people. And when Astra falls in love and starts pulling away from her, Rieke wonders if there’s anything in her life she can count on—and, if so, if she has the power to hold on to it. Then—war breaks out in Europe. First the Russians, then the Germans, invaded Czernowitz. Almost overnight, Rieke and Astra’s world changes, and every day becomes a struggle: to keep their grandfather’s business, to keep their home, to keep their lives. Rieke has long known that she exists in a world defined by those who have power and those who do not, and as those powers close in around her, she must decide whether holding on to her life might mean letting go of everything that has ever mattered to her—and if that’s a choice she will even have the chance to make.

During World War II, families all across Europe huddled together in basements, attics, and closets as Nazi soldiers rounded up anyone Jewish. The Star of David, a symbol of faith and pride, became a tool of hate when the Nazis forced Jewish people to carry papers stamped with that star, so that it was clear who to capture. But many brave souls dared to help them. Jewish teenager Jacqueline Gauthier, a member of the French Resistance who had to conceal her identity, was one who risked her life in secret workshops, forging papers with new names and without stars in order to help others escape. But how to get these life-saving papers to families in hiding? An ordinary wooden toy duck held the answer, a hidden compartment: hope in a hollow.

Adam and Victor are brothers who have the usual fights over the remote, which movie to watch and whether or not it's morally acceptable to eat people. Well, not so much eat... just drink a little blood. They're vampires, hiding in plain sight with their eclectic yet loving family. Ten-year-old Adam knows he has a better purpose in his life (well, immortal life) than just drinking blood, but fourteen-year-old Victor wants to accept his own self-image of vampirism. Everything changes when bodies start to appear all over town, and it becomes clear that a vampire hunter may be on the lookout for the family. Can Adam and Victor reconcile their differences and work together to stop the killer before it's too late?

For TV-obsessed Jake Lightman, his parents' divorce is like his favorite show getting canceled: The worst. Now he's stuck between playing the role of "Yaakov" for his mother and "Jacob" for his father. On Jake's first day at a new school, Caleb and Tehilla barrel into his life. Suddenly, he has two friends who seem to like the real Jake. And when they invite him to Camp Gershoni for the summer, Jake knows he has to go-even if his parents won't let him. With help from Caleb and Tehilla, Jake concocts a web of lies to get to camp. But he struggles to keep up the ruse-and be a good friend at the same time. As the cost of lying grows, he must decide what's truly important, or risk losing the people he cares about the most.

In 1905 North Dakota, eleven-year-old Russian immigrant Shoshana is bullied for being Jewish, but after listening to the music of her homeland, she is reminded of the resilience and traditions her people have brought all the way to the prairie.

Courage to Dream plunges readers into the darkest time of human history-the Holocaust. This graphic novel explores one of the greatest atrocities in modern memory, delving into the core of what it means to face the extinction of everything and everyone you hold dear. This gripping, multifaceted tapestry is woven from Jewish folklore and cultural history. Five interlocking narratives explore one common story--the tradition of resistance and uplift. Internationally renowned author Neal Shusterman and illustrator Andrés Vera Martínez have created a masterwork that encourages the compassionate, bold reaching for a dream.

A true story of two Jewish teenagers racing against time during the Holocaust: one in hiding in Hungary, and the other in Auschwitz, plotting escape.

Lithuania, 1943. A father drowns in the all-consuming grief of a daughter killed by the Nazis. He can't bring her back. But he can use kishuf, an ancient and profane magic to create an avenging golem in her image. Vera was made for vengeance. She is the Jew that the Nazis cannot kill. But is she more than the wrath that her creator infused within her?