Weekend Pick for December 6, 2024
 Lesley Roessing | Meet our December contributor Lesley Roessing. She is a former middle school and high school ELA teacher, a K-8 charter school literary consultant, a Writing Project director and instructor of teacher education, including courses on Adolescent Literature, and shares recommendations and reviews of her reading on her website at https://www.literacywithlesley.com/book-reviews.html. She has written books on literacy for teachers and school librarians, such as Talking Tests: A Teachers’ Guide to Book Clubs across the Curriculum. |
I, Lesley, have written that one of the most effective ways to learn about any historical event, and the nuances and effects of those events, is through novel study—the power of story. Every historical event is distinct and affects people and places uniquely—and each is surrounded by misconceptions, misunderstandings, miscommunications, and differing and shifting perspectives. We may learn about history through textbooks and lectures, but we experience history through novels. And when we live it, we learn it; we do not merely learn about it. We discern the complex issues, and we feel empathy for all affected. We bear witness to the events we read and the plights of the people affected by those events.
Gringolandia, Torch, and Eyes Open by Lyn Miller-Lachmann
Author Lyn Miller-Lachmann received her Master’s in Library and Information Science and edited the journal MultiCultural Review. She also received a MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from Vermont College of Fine Arts. Lyn has taught both middle and high school English, social studies, and Jewish studies; translates books from Portuguese; and writes a blog at https://lynmillerlachmann.com/. She has written 6 novels, a picture book, co-authored a book on women film directors, and contributed to the She Persisted series with a book on Temple Grandin.
In the last few years, I have learned about some of the most interesting periods in history through the novels of Lyn Miller-Lachmann. These three novels cover social justice in 1980-1991 Chile, 1968-69 Czechoslovakia, and 1967 Portugal.
Gringolandia shares the story of high school student Daniel, a refugee from Chile's Pinochet regime, his activist "gringo" girlfriend Courtney, and Daniel's father who has just been released from years of torture in a Chilean prison and joins his family in Gringolandia. Spanning 1980-1991 this novel would be a valuable addition to a Social Justice or Social Studies curriculum or as in my personal case, a good read to learn a history generally not covered in curriculum.
On August 21, 1968, the Soviet Union and three other Communist regimes—Poland, Hungary, and Bulgaria—invaded Czechoslovakia. The new wave of repression that followed saw the withdrawal of freedoms, mass firings, expulsions from the Party, the imprisonment of dissidents, and the closing of the borders. (Author’s Note)
Taking place from December 1968 to Summer 1969, Torch is a story of not only an historic time period but of resilience, freedoms, resistance, creativity, family, and, above all, friendship.
When 17-year-old Pavol finds his dreams of attending university in Prague have been ended by the Party and he faces a life in the mines that killed his father, he and his friends Stepan and Tomas write a letter to deliver to the castle in Prague. When he and Stepan are stopped and sent away, Pavol follows the example of martyr Jan Palach and sets himself on fire, a human torch.
Gringolandia shares the story of high school student Daniel, a refugee from Chile's Pinochet regime, his activist "gringo" girlfriend Courtney, and Daniel's father who has just been released from years of torture in a Chilean prison and joins his family in Gringolandia. Spanning 1980-1991 this novel would be a valuable addition to a Social Justice or Social Studies curriculum or as in my personal case, a good read to learn a history generally not covered in curriculum.
On August 21, 1968, the Soviet Union and three other Communist regimes—Poland, Hungary, and Bulgaria—invaded Czechoslovakia. The new wave of repression that followed saw the withdrawal of freedoms, mass firings, expulsions from the Party, the imprisonment of dissidents, and the closing of the borders. (Author’s Note)
Taking place from December 1968 to Summer 1969, Torch is a story of not only an historic time period but of resilience, freedoms, resistance, creativity, family, and, above all, friendship.
When 17-year-old Pavol finds his dreams of attending university in Prague have been ended by the Party and he faces a life in the mines that killed his father, he and his friends Stepan and Tomas write a letter to deliver to the castle in Prague. When he and Stepan are stopped and sent away, Pavol follows the example of martyr Jan Palach and sets himself on fire, a human torch.
 Lyn Miller-Lachmann |  |
Readers see how not only the increasing restrictive and punitive government’s actions but also Pavol’s actions affect his pregnant girlfriend Lydia; her father, Ondrej, a WWII freedom fighter; his friends Stepan and Tomas; and his mother and three younger sisters. But his death didn't affect anything else.
Stepan, a former bully who had been transformed through his friendship with—and maybe a crush on—the kind Pavol, socially awkward Tomas whose father is high in the Party and calls him “antisocial” and threatening to send him to a mental hospital when he turns 18, and Lydia, pregnant with Pavol’s child became real, working their ways into my heart, feeling their pain and frustrations and cheering any victories as they formed unlikely bonds with each other as they began trying to support each other on to lives with the freedoms they needed.
The newest novel, Eyes Open, a verse novel, was spellbinding and eye-opening. I lived in 1967 Portugal with 15-year-old Sonia Maria Fernandes Dias through the highs and many lows of her year—as she writes poetry, fighting the nuns for the right to write in free, not rhymed, verse which she writes about her boyfriend, Ze Miquel, a revolutionary. In the future she will write books, he as illustrator. Sonia’s—and Portugal’s—story is most powerfully written; the author again puts the reader into the life and hearts of the characters.
"The bigger the issue, the smaller you write" claims Richard Price. We read for many reasons but one essential purpose is to learn about our world, including its history, and develop empathy for others.
Stepan, a former bully who had been transformed through his friendship with—and maybe a crush on—the kind Pavol, socially awkward Tomas whose father is high in the Party and calls him “antisocial” and threatening to send him to a mental hospital when he turns 18, and Lydia, pregnant with Pavol’s child became real, working their ways into my heart, feeling their pain and frustrations and cheering any victories as they formed unlikely bonds with each other as they began trying to support each other on to lives with the freedoms they needed.
The newest novel, Eyes Open, a verse novel, was spellbinding and eye-opening. I lived in 1967 Portugal with 15-year-old Sonia Maria Fernandes Dias through the highs and many lows of her year—as she writes poetry, fighting the nuns for the right to write in free, not rhymed, verse which she writes about her boyfriend, Ze Miquel, a revolutionary. In the future she will write books, he as illustrator. Sonia’s—and Portugal’s—story is most powerfully written; the author again puts the reader into the life and hearts of the characters.
"The bigger the issue, the smaller you write" claims Richard Price. We read for many reasons but one essential purpose is to learn about our world, including its history, and develop empathy for others.
RSS Feed