Small Acts of Defiance
Title | Small Acts of Defiance PDF eBook |
Author | Michelle Wright |
Publisher | HarperCollins |
Pages | 371 |
Release | 2022-07-19 |
Genre | Fiction |
ISBN | 0063223899 |
"In Small Acts of Defiance, Michelle Wright paints a beautifully intimate portrait that celebrates the courage and resilience of the human spirit."— Jane Harper, author of The Survivors A stunning debut WWII novel from award-winning short story writer Michelle Wright, about the small but courageous acts a young woman performs against the growing anti-Jewish measures in Nazi-occupied Paris. “Doing nothing is still a choice. A choice to stand aside and let it happen.” January 1940: After a devastating tragedy, young Australian woman Lucie and her mother Yvonne are forced to leave home and flee to France. There they seek help from the only family they have left, Lucie’s uncle, Gérard. As the Second World War engulfs Europe, the two women find themselves trapped in German-occupied Paris, sharing a cramped apartment with the authoritarian Gérard and his extremist views. Drawing upon her artistic talents, Lucie risks her own safety to engage in small acts of defiance against the occupying Nazi forces and the collaborationist French regime – illustrating pro-resistance tracts and forging identity cards. Faced with the escalating brutality of anti-Jewish measures, and the indifference of so many of her fellow Parisians, Lucie must decide how far she will go to protect her friends and defend the rights of others before it’s too late.
Our Missing Hearts
Title | Our Missing Hearts PDF eBook |
Author | Celeste Ng |
Publisher | Penguin |
Pages | 286 |
Release | 2022-10-04 |
Genre | Fiction |
ISBN | 0593492552 |
An instant New York Times bestseller • A New York Times Notable Book of 2022 • Named a Best Book of 2022 by People, TIME Magazine, The Washington Post, USA Today, NPR, Los Angeles Times, and Oprah Daily, and more • A Reese's Book Club Pick • New York Times Paperback Row Selection From the #1 bestselling author of Little Fires Everywhere, comes the inspiring new novel about a mother’s unshakeable love. “It’s impossible not to be moved.” —Stephen King, The New York Times Book Review “Riveting, tender, and timely.” —People, Book of the Week “Thought-provoking, heart-wrenching . . . I was so invested in the future of this mother and son, and I can’t wait to hear what you think of this deeply suspenseful story!” —Reese Witherspoon (Reese’s Book Club Pick) Twelve-year-old Bird Gardner lives a quiet existence with his loving father, a former linguist who now shelves books in a university library. His mother Margaret, a Chinese American poet, left without a trace when he was nine years old. He doesn’t know what happened to her—only that her books have been banned—and he resents that she cared more about her work than about him. Then one day, Bird receives a mysterious letter containing only a cryptic drawing, and soon he is pulled into a quest to find her. His journey will take him back to the many folktales she poured into his head as a child, through the ranks of an underground network of heroic librarians, and finally to New York City, where he will finally learn the truth about what happened to his mother, and what the future holds for them both. Our Missing Hearts is an old story made new, of the ways supposedly civilized communities can ignore the most searing injustice. It’s about the lessons and legacies we pass on to our children, and the power of art to create change.
Resistance
Title | Resistance PDF eBook |
Author | Agnes Humbert |
Publisher | A&C Black |
Pages | 420 |
Release | 2008-11-03 |
Genre | Fiction |
ISBN | 1408801620 |
'Agnès Humbert bears devastating witness to her time ... An insider's account of the germination of the French Resistance' William Boyd 'Sober and testifying, sardonic and humorous ... A beautiful and powerful work of literature' The Times In the summer of 1940, as the German Occupation tightened its grip on Paris, Agnès Humbert helped to establish one of the first resistance cells. She had no experience in warfare: she was an art historian, as were most of her early comrades, colleagues from the Musée de l'Homme in Paris. All they had was an unquenchable desire to free their country from the horrors of Nazi occupation. Within a year the group was publishing a news bulletin, helping allied airmen escape and passing military information back to London. Then came the catastrophe of betrayal, followed by arrest and interrogation, imprisonment and trial and, for Agnès, deportation to slave labour camp in Germany. Résistance is the secret journal of a woman who never gave up hope, even in the face of impossible odds.
Puff Piece
Title | Puff Piece PDF eBook |
Author | John Safran |
Publisher | Random House Australia |
Pages | 370 |
Release | 2022-08-30 |
Genre | |
ISBN | 1760890162 |
Courage & Defiance: Stories of Spies, Saboteurs, and Survivors in World War II Denmark (Scholastic Focus)
Title | Courage & Defiance: Stories of Spies, Saboteurs, and Survivors in World War II Denmark (Scholastic Focus) PDF eBook |
Author | Deborah Hopkinson |
Publisher | Scholastic Inc. |
Pages | 331 |
Release | 2015-08-25 |
Genre | Juvenile Nonfiction |
ISBN | 0545592224 |
Critically acclaimed Sibert Honor author Deborah Hopkinson brings to bold life the remarkable story of the Danish resistance and rescue of over 7,000 Jews during WWII. When the Nazis invaded Denmark the morning of Tuesday, April 9, 1940, the people of this tiny country to the north of Germany awoke to a devastating surprise. The government of Denmark surrendered quietly, and the Danes were ordered to go about their daily lives as if nothing had changed. But everything had changed. Award-winning author Deborah Hopkinson traces the stories of the heroic young men and women who would not stand by as their country was occupied. Rather, they fought back. Some were spies, passing tactical information to the British; some were saboteurs, who aimed to hamper and impede Nazi operations in Denmark; and 95% of the Jewish population of Denmark were survivors, rescued by their fellow countrymen, who had the courage and conscience that drove them to act. With her extraordinary talent for digging deep in her research and weaving real voices into her narratives, Hopkinson reveals the thrilling truth behind one of WWII's most daring resistance movements.
Farthing
Title | Farthing PDF eBook |
Author | Jo Walton |
Publisher | Macmillan |
Pages | 272 |
Release | 2006-08-08 |
Genre | Fiction |
ISBN | 1429944404 |
An influential family’s weekend party is the stage for murder in this alternative history trilogy opener set in a post-WWII England where the Nazis won. Eight years have passed since the upper-crust “Farthing Set” overthrew Winston Churchill and led Britain into a separate peace with Hitler. Now those families have gathered for a weekend retreat. Among them is estranged scion Lucy Kahn, who can’t understand why she and her husband, David, were so enthusiastically invited. But all becomes clear when the eminent Sir James Thirkie is found murdered—with a yellow Star of David pinned to his chest. Lucy realizes that her Jewish husband is about to be framed for the crime, an outcome that would be altogether too politically convenient, given the machinations underway in Parliament in the coming week. The Farthing Set are determined to pass laws further restricting the right to vote, and a new outcry against Jews and foreigners would suit them fine. But whoever’s behind the murder and the frame-up didn’t count on the principal investigator from Scotland Yard being so prone to look beyond the obvious—or his being a man with his own private reasons for sympathizing with outcasts and underdogs . . . Praise for Farthing “If le Carré scares you, try Jo Walton. Of course her brilliant story of a democracy selling itself out to fascism sixty years ago is just a mystery, just a thriller, just a fantasy—of course we know nothing like that could happen now. Don’t we?” —Ursula K. Le Guin “Walton . . . crosses genres without missing a beat with this stunningly powerful alternative history set in 1949. . . . While the whodunit plot is compelling, it’s the convincing portrait of a country’s incremental slide into fascism that makes this novel a standout. Mainstream readers should be enthralled as well.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train
Title | You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train PDF eBook |
Author | Howard Zinn |
Publisher | Beacon Press |
Pages | 269 |
Release | 2018-09-18 |
Genre | Biography & Autobiography |
ISBN | 0807045020 |
If you’re both overcome and angered by the atrocities of our time, this will inspire a “new generation of activists and ordinary people who search for hope in the darkness” (Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor). Is change possible? Where will it come from? Can we actually make a difference? How do we remain hopeful? Howard Zinn—activist, historian, and author of A People’s History of the United States—was a participant in and chronicler of some of the landmark struggles for racial and economic justice in US history. In his memoir, You Can’t Be Neutral on a Moving Train, Zinn reflects on more than thirty years of fighting for social change, from his teenage years as a laborer in Brooklyn to teaching at Spelman College, where he emerged in the civil rights movement as a powerful voice for justice. A former bombardier in World War II, he later became an outspoken antiwar activist, spirited protestor, and champion of civil disobedience. Throughout his life, Zinn was unwavering in his belief that “small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world.” With a foreword from activist and scholar Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, this revised edition will inspire a new generation of readers to believe that change is possible.