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4.0
Assigned reading for MLIS 7421: Multicultural Youth Literature.
The Diary of Laura's Twin tackles an interesting concept that I hadn't heard of before, but have now learned is actually a fairly common practice in Jewish communities: "twinning", or learning about a child of the same age from the Holocaust days to commemorate them during the Jewish child's Bar/Bat Mitzvah. I think this is such a fantastic idea, so reading about it as the plot of the story was actually quite interesting.
While I didn't particularly enjoy the writing itself, as it was definitely on the younger end of middle grade stories, there's a lot of good discussion going on in this book. Laura's kind of a brat in the beginning, but she grows a lot as her life is put into perspective and she grows to count her blessings a bit. My favorite aspect of the entire thing was actually her friendship with non-Jewish Nix, who starts the book pretty heartless in regards to the Holocaust as a whole, putting Laura into the interesting position of learning that sometimes, just because a friend seems like a 'good' person, doesn't mean that they empathize with your experiences or see outside of the bubble of their own privilege. Of course, Nix grows and learns from her mistakes, but the entire scenario revolving around her reaction to Laura's "twinning" experience is pretty insightful and could offer a lot to young readers.
The Diary of Laura's Twin tackles an interesting concept that I hadn't heard of before, but have now learned is actually a fairly common practice in Jewish communities: "twinning", or learning about a child of the same age from the Holocaust days to commemorate them during the Jewish child's Bar/Bat Mitzvah. I think this is such a fantastic idea, so reading about it as the plot of the story was actually quite interesting.
While I didn't particularly enjoy the writing itself, as it was definitely on the younger end of middle grade stories, there's a lot of good discussion going on in this book. Laura's kind of a brat in the beginning, but she grows a lot as her life is put into perspective and she grows to count her blessings a bit. My favorite aspect of the entire thing was actually her friendship with non-Jewish Nix, who starts the book pretty heartless in regards to the Holocaust as a whole, putting Laura into the interesting position of learning that sometimes, just because a friend seems like a 'good' person, doesn't mean that they empathize with your experiences or see outside of the bubble of their own privilege. Of course, Nix grows and learns from her mistakes, but the entire scenario revolving around her reaction to Laura's "twinning" experience is pretty insightful and could offer a lot to young readers.
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