Merry Christmas everyone! It is only about a week away!! This is a time of year where warm fuzzy feelings are in abundance and "Rad Women Worldwide", by Kate Schatz, will definitely add to that. This book is full of inspirational stories of women across the globe. Women from the past and some currently changing the world. Each story takes up about one page and gives enough information to leave the reader feeling inspired without getting into deeper details. There are also illustrations to go with each story.
This book is perfect for anyone that loves to learn about the difference that women can make. The stories vary so much and provide something for every type of female out there. As the cover says, "Artists and athletes, pirates and punks, and other revolutionaries who shaped history." These are truly empowering stories and might encourage readers to look more deeply into these women's lives. It's not the type of book that you would sit down and read in one go, but read a few stories here and there. It would make a great present for any girls looking for some female role models. Check it out and let me know what you think!
I received a copy of "Rad Women Worldwide" from Blogging For Books for this review. Click here to learn more about the author, Kate Schatz.
I've been trying to expand my horizons a little bit and read more non-fiction books. My Mom recommended "A Lucky Child", by Thomas Buergenthal. It is an amazing tale about a young boy who survives the holocaust. I didn't know this, but apparently almost all of the children were killed instead of put in concentration camps. They were pulled away from their parents and blown up, shot, or put in gas chambers so that the Nazi soldiers wouldn't have to deal with them. Amazingly, Thomas Buergenthal, was able to avoid being pulled away with the other children. In some cases it seems like divine intervention, other times it was the ingenuity of his parents, but his mom claimed that he was just plain lucky.
His parents go through a tough time as they are driven from place to place trying to find somewhere safe for their family. They end up in a Jewish ghetto in Poland where they think they will live until the war ends. Little did they know what was in store for them. Thomas shares some very incredible stories about how his family was able to stick together for the first part of the war, and then once they were separated it gets even more amazing. He survives Auschwitz and the well-known death march. How a 10-year old boy could have the wits and courage to be able to do what he did to survive...well, it truly is just incredible.
This book probably won't make you cry; although it shares horrible ugly events, it's told in a detached way which seemed to help dampen the sadness. Only the first half of the book is on what happened during the war, the rest of the book is about what happened after the war. I love that the author included this in his book because a lot of stories end when the war ended, but there was so much that happened after that. He explains how hard it was to go back to Germany and live among people who only months before were responsible for the awful things he had to go through. Despite it all, he became a pretty incredible person. If you are into WW2 stories, then this is definitely one to check out.
Okay, so I am not exactly a history buff...Whenever I think of World War 2 my mind immediately jumps to Germans. I don't know that I've ever really made the connection that we were fighting the Germans and the Japanese at the same time. I know I learned it all in my History classes, but I must have focused more on Germany than Japan I guess. Well the book "Unbroken", by Laura Hillenbrand, definitely reminded me of what our country went through during our war against Japan.
Hillenbrand tells the story of Louis Zamperini - a little hellion who eventually channels his excess energy into running as a young adult and later makes it to the Berlin Olympics before becoming an airman in the U.S. Army. Zamperini and his crew seem invincible; returning alive from missions running on fumes or with a plane riddled with bullet holes. Invincible, until the day they do go down and their crew is downsized to just three survivors floating in a raft with no food and minimal water. And yet somehow they manage to stay alive during their 47 day float before finding land. The part I cant really wrap my head around is the idea of having sharks swimming around you 24/7 just waiting for you to get in the water, rubbing their backs along the bottom of the raft just to let you know they are still there...that right there would be enough to send my sanity out the window. And that's only the beginning of the horrible trials that these boys had to go through!
The author does a wonderful job depicting this inspirational story. The way she writes is almost cinematic, like you are watching a movie of what you are reading in your head. It's very attention grabbing and will suck you in from the very first page to the last. It is a story that kids younger than high school age may not be prepared to read, but anyone that age or older will most likely enjoy this book. It's definitely the kind of inspiring story that you will remember for the rest of your life, and will remind you to be grateful for the life you have. Because no matter how bad your life may seem, it's no where near as bad as what the boys in this book had to go through. I give this book my seal of approval and recommend that you find the time to read it. It will probably take a week or two to get through (depending on how much time you have), but it is worth it. So enjoy, and don't forget to let me know what you think!
