As communists take over Vietnam, Catholic farmers find themselves threatened. By the thousands they become refugees and attempt to flee persecution. This is one family's four-decade long story as they make attempts to live free.

Narrative nonfiction account of a Vietnamese family as they try to escape the expanding communist regime of Ho Chi Minh.

I dedicate this book to my son Leslie, because he agreed to travel with me to Shanghai, Bogota, and my birthplace Gumbinnen, otherwise this book would never have been written. Now he knows my background, and he can answer any questions his children and future grandchildren may have. Many American friends asked me about my past when they heard my German accent, and when I told my story they would say, ́write a book! ́ so finally I did. I wish I could thank many people for helping me to write it, but sadly they have all died, including my wife Erica. She encouraged me to keep writing, and she read, reread and corrected every page. Without her, I would not have finished the book. I enjoy telling my story at the 92nd Street Y or the Witness Theater or to whomever wants to hear it. I feel like it is my duty to educate people about the Jews of Shanghai during World War II. I am grateful to have had the life I had, which was not a conventional one, but I know I was loved, first by my parents, and then by my step-parents. I am fortunate to have had wonderful friends and a successful business and to have found Erica, to whom I was married for fifty years. I take immense pleasure in Leslie ́s family. I am grateful to Margie. I play tennis, I stay well, and I pray every day. I continue to try to do good in the world. And I always tell my two grandchildren, ́if I didn't end up in Shanghai I would not be here today and neither would you... ́ (Jerry Lindenstraus)

A reliable historical account is a recitation of past truths and an important guide to living life in the present. A study of history enables future generations to avoid the pitfalls experienced by those who have lived before. This is a historical novel based in part on a true story about a Jewish familys quest to escape oppression in Ukraine in the early twentieth century. The story traces the virulent anti-Semitism against the Jewish people in Ukraine and their need to escape from the darkness of a tsarist autocracy. In the guise of offering more freedoms to a downtrodden people, the tsarist regime was overthrown in a revolution led by the Marxist dictatorship of Lenin and then Stalin. That dictatorship became even more oppressive than the heavy hand of the tsar. The Jewish family became separated from the father when he escaped to the United States with the intent of the family joining him within months. Then the Great War closed all the doors for escape, and for almost eight years, a mother and her three young children lived through the horrors of world war, revolution, civil war, and communist dictatorship behind what became known as the Iron Curtain. The story culminates in the escape and ultimate reunion of the family with the father in the land of the free, the United States of America.

Walter Zehl’s story provides a rare, first-hand glimpse into a German soldier’s adventures, fighting in World War II. Walter’s numerous brushes with death are chronicled and how he used resilience, forged in adversity, to conquer all. But this autobiographical narrative is much more than a war story. It describes Walter’s early life in prewar Germany and tells of his daring escape over the border to West Germany, immigration to America and his struggles in pursuit of the American Dream. For those who aspire to write their own oral history, a step-by-step guide is included as an added bonus. This guide contains valuable tips and insights sure to bolster the success of any oral history project.

From award-winning author Deborah Heiligman comes Torpedoed, a true account of the attack and sinking of the passenger ship SS City of Benares, which was evacuating children from England during WWII. Amid the constant rain of German bombs and the escalating violence of World War II, British parents by the thousands chose to send their children out of the country: the wealthy, independently; the poor, through a government relocation program called CORB. In September 1940, passenger liner SS City of Benares set sail for Canada with one hundred children on board. When the war ships escorting the Benares departed, a German submarine torpedoed what became known as the Children's Ship. Out of tragedy, ordinary people became heroes. This is their story. This title has Common Core connections.

When the Sudanese civil war reaches his village in 1985, 11-year-old Salva becomes separated from his family and must walk with other Dinka tribe members through southern Sudan, Ethiopia and Kenya in search of safe haven. Based on the life of Salva Dut, who, after emigrating to America in 1996, began a project to dig water wells in Sudan. By a Newbery Medal-winning author.