general

• quick summary - a doll named karolina travels from the land of the dolls to a toyshop in 1939 kraków, just before the war broke. along with the heart-broken but magical dollmaker, they help their jewish friends in the face of the nazi occupation and hopefully find a way to save karolina's homeland from their invaders.
• key themes - compassion, hope, war, courage, magic, love, friendship.
• fav character - rena <3 she made me cry for all the children that were lost in the holocaust. what a brave, lovely, and kind girl.

interests

• what i found interesting - I loved how the author merged history, folklore, and fairytale in just one book.The writing was absolutely magical, and I felt emotional multiple times while reading it.
• what i learned - while having studied the holocaust and knowing how ww2 started, I never learned much about the specificities of the nazi occupation of poland. it was both heartbreaking and interesting to learn the details. I also had no idea about polish folklore, and it was lovely to learn about it too!
• fav quote - "because if she gave these beautiful parts of herself to the dollmaker, she would always be close to him, and it would not matter how much distance separated them otherwise"

further reading

• follow-up context research - this book made me want to visit kraków! in the meantime, I will look more into the story of the nazi occupation of poland.

rating

• 4.25/5 - I don't know why I thought that a middle-grade book taking place during ww2 was not going to make me cry but oh boy did I cry at the end. It is a beautiful story, and even the 'bad' characters were written in a realistic and nuanced way. it took me a while to read it, I think because I was dreading what I deep down knew was going to happen. I would definitely give it to any middle schooler I know who loves history- it is a gift to teach a preteen audience about such a horrid time in such clever, wonderful, and compassionate prose.