He paused then, and looked at me. I was frozen like a Polish winter. I was cold right through into my bones. "You know, Miriam," Mr. Kraszewski suggested, "you could be one of us.""They won't kill everyone in the ghetto right away," he continued, his voice matter-of-fact. "They still need workers. But not for too long. After all, they have us Poles to work for them, don't they?"
Award-winning novelist Carol Matas brings readers into the heart of Nazi Germany with the harrowing story of Marisa, a Polish Jew whose blonde hair and blue eyes make it easy for her to pass as a Christian. With the Nazis ready to herd the remaining Jews of her town into a ghetto, and with her family either scattered or dead, Marisa takes the papers of a Polish girl and in that disguise goes to Germany in a desperate attempt to survive as a Polish worker.
After traveling to Weimar, Marisa finds work as a servant for the Reymanns, a wealthy farming family who treat her with dignity and respect. Their daughter Charlotte becomes fond of Marisa and wants to be her friend. Marisa's life with the Reymanns may seem safe, the Reymanns appear fair, but she can never forget that Herr Reymann is a high-ranking Nazi official and Charlotte attends the League of German Maidens. Marisa is hiding in plain sight in her enemy's house.
Carol Matas's unflinching account of Marisa's dilemma as a Jew living a lie in order ot survive will give readers a new perspective on the nature of good and evil even as it touches their hearts.
