Review: Stars of the Night
Stars of the Night: The Courageous Children of the Czech Kindertransport by Caren Stelson, illustrated by Selina Alko Carolrhoda (imprint of Lerner Publishing Group), 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Heather J. Matthews Buy at Bookshop.org Opening with the Talmud quote “save one life, save the world,” Stars of the Night tells the nonfiction story of a group of children. With narration in the third person plural, the reader is transported to Prague, Czechoslovakia, in 1939. With a group of Jewish children ages from 7 to 10, we are shown scenes of sunny afternoon picnicking with mothers and hot chocolate-filled café nights with fathers. However, by November 1938, “something happened,” and the city of Prague is surrounded by tent camps filled with war refugees. Soon, the children begin to experience threats from local children, and the parents of Prague beginning making “arrangements” with a mysterious and unnamed man. These nebulous arrangements, we find out later, come to fru...