Short Synopsis
Based on a true story, Amira Keidar's engrossing debut follows Lalechka, a little girl born into the chaos of war and the holocaust.

Full Synopsis
It's a warm and muggy Saturday night in August of 1942. The Nazis are liquidating the ghetto of Shedlitz, an industrial town east of Warsaw, Poland. Zippa, a twenty-seven-year-old Jewish woman, finds temporary shelter in a small attic, together with her baby daughter and a hundred frightened Jews. When the Nazi noose is tightened around her neck, Zippa asks her husband Jacob, a Jewish policeman in the ghetto, to save their little girl from certain death. The young father manages to smuggle his wife and daughter to the gentile part of town, where Zippa's childhood girlfriends Sophia and Irena reside.

This is the real story of one Jewish family confronted by the terror of Nazi rule. The book follows Lalechka, the little girl born into the chaos of war and holocaust and forced to struggle with the reversals of fortune that led her each time into foreign and terrifying regions. But, beyond that, it is the story of the true friendship of three girls in early twentieth-century Poland, a friendship that won’t cower before government dictates.

"Lalechka is a moving story about a little girl and her family, from her childhood in the ghetto to the end of the war." ---Dr. Yael Nidam-Orbito, chief editor, Yad Vashem Publications

"This important book assists in keeping and documenting the history of the Jewish people during the holocaust." ---Amiel Sheffer, Central Zionist Archives

"The book Lalechka is beautiful. It is written in a fluent and fascinating way making the reader feel as if the author herself was in the places in the story and he - the reader - is there with her." ---Dalia Guy, Beit Lohamei Haghetaot (Ghetto Fighters' Library)

"The book Lalechka is fascinating. I love the descriptions of the workshops and businesses in Siedlce." ---Elizabeth Rynecki, Chasing Portraits