#MMGM: Alias Anna by Susan Hood with Greg Dawson
REVIEW
Zhanna and Frina Arshanskaya grew up in an Ukraine under Russian control. Still, despite the family's poverty and Jewish heritage, the girls developed into piano prodigies, attending an elite music school, and even helping pay their family's way. When World War II arrived on their doorstep, everything changed as the Nazis put them under surveillance before arresting all the Jews in town and marching them away to be killed. Zhanna's daring nature helped feed her family during this difficult time. On the final march, her father bribes a guard into letting her escape telling her, "I don't care what you do. Just live." Later, Zhanna meets up with her sister, who somehow unknown to this day, managed to escape also. Despite some help from former neighbors the girls eventually must leave their home town and find an orphanage to stay in so they can get legitimate papers with false names. After numerous difficulties the girls finally manage to find such an orphanage. But the orphanage's piano and their own incredible skill puts them in the sights of the Nazis once again. The girls spent the remainder of the war under the thumb of the Nazis desperately trying to keep their Jewish heritage hidden behind their false names but there were a couple of close calls thanks to some jealous ballerinas. Having survived the war, the girls decide, thanks to Frina's absolute refusal to return to Ukraine, to emigrate to America, where they build new lives for themselves. Thanks to a school assignment of her granddaughter's and her son's careful research, Zhanna's story eventually comes to light.
Susan Hood's beautiful free verse combined with Greg Dawson's careful research tell Zhanna's story in a powerful, heart-wrenching way. The girls' courage and determination to survive in the face of very threatening, sometimes deadly, challenges is inspiring and remarkable. Zhanna's strong spirit and love of life left their mark on me as I read her story, although I sometimes empathized with her parents struggles to manage their very strong willed young girl. I also found it fascinating to read about how the book came to be and how Zhanna finally told her story thanks to a request from her own young granddaughter. The discovery of Zhanna and Frina's names on a memorial in Ukraine made the story all the more real. The free verse form used in the book gives the reader a chance to dive headfirst into the incredible emotions that Zhanna and her sister faced while trying to survive. For young readers who found Anne Frank's story compelling, I highly recommend this one. And for those unfamiliar with the toll the Holocaust and the events around it took, this is an eye-opener of a book. I would recommend it for older middle grade readers with some maturity just because of the brutal nature of some of the events. While not graphic, there is no changing the awful things that happened during World War II and the years proceeding it.
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