Stolen Child

Stolen Child
By Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch
Published by Scholastic Canada
Ages 9-14
Reviewed by Martha Beach

Coming to Canada after spending five years in a Displaced Persons camp in Austria is a huge change for Nadia. She moves into a new house in Brantford, Ontario, which takes some getting used to. But she is now safe in Canada, away from Europe and away from the war.

But soon after she arrives, Nadia starts to have dreams, nightmares, and flashbacks of the war years in Europe. Are they simply nightmares or they memories? This is what Nadia has to find out.

While Nadia adjusts to her present and future life in Canada in a new house, a new school, new customs, new neighbours, and even new parents, she must also deal with her past. She must try and remember what happened to her in the old country before she can feel safe and comfortable in her new one.

For her first summer in Canada, Nadia spends day times with Miss MacIntosh, a neighbour on her new street who teaches her how to speak English.

But when Nadia starts school in the fall, her classmates tease her and are mean and unfriendly. simply because she isn't Canadian in their eyes. They call her the “Hitler girl” because of her blonde hair and blue eyes.

But Canada is Nadia's new home and she will have to let go of her old life and make a new one in Canada.

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An Illustrated History of Canada's Native People

An Illustrated History of Canada's Native People:
I have Lived Here Since the World Began
By Arthur J. Ray
Published by Key Porter Books
Reviewed by Martha Beach and Lisa Tran

This illustrated text chronicles the history of Canada's Native People, from their first contact with settlers to their current land claims. The book includes many black and white photographs, aboriginal paintings, and maps throughout the text to help enhance the reader's understanding of native history.

Canada's Natives have lived on the land since the Ice Age and were accomplished traders, artisans, farmers and hunters long before the first Europeans reached the shores. The contact between Aboriginals and European explorers was, at first, a period of growth and opportunity. But the extremely different cultures soon clashed.

From the Native People's settlement in Canada 12,000 years ago to the events that we now see on our evening news and in newspapers, An Illustrated History of Canada's Native People is a text that encapsulates the detailed history of one of our founding groups of people.

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