The Cats in Krasinski Square by Karen Hesse, Illustrated by Wendy Watson

An introductory picture book about the Holocaust, The Cats in Krasinski Square is geared for upper elementary students in grades 3-5. The Cats in Krasinski Square shares the story of a group of people who risk their lives in devising a plan to get food and supplies to those still trapped inside Warsaw's ghetto walls. I had mixed feelings about this book because it glanced over some of the underlying deeper issues associated with Holocaust like many Holocaust books for children tend to do. The title itself is vague, and by simply looking at the front cover, you wouldn't even know that this book had anything to do with the Holocaust.

However, upon reading, this story did provide some basic idea of the struggle people in Warsaw faced. For students who have never heard of the Holocaust before, this book could serve as an introductory book in a Holocaust unit. The young girl narrator herself has lost most of her family to the war. Jewish herself, she and her sister were able to escape the walls of the ghetto and now pass for being Polish. By passing, the narrator and her sister avoid the turmoil associated with being Jewish. "I wear my Polish look, I walk my Polish walk, Polish words float from my lips..." The cats mirror the lives of many Jewish families. Cats now wander the streets too living off of mice and not in the comfort of an owner's home. It is these same cats that are used to distract the Gestapo police dogs as people risk their lives to get food into the ghetto. The Jewish Resistance Movement, amidst adversity, is willing to risk risk their lives for those trapped inside the ghetto.

The author's note and historical note at the end of the story provide a much-needed frame of reference. When reading the author's note, I learned that this story was actually based on true events. The Jewish Resistance had used cats as one technique to outsmart the Gestapo at the train station in Warsaw during World War II. By reading the historical note, readers gain the context of the time. If I was to use this story in the classroom, I think I would start by reading the historical note so that students know the conditions in Warsaw prior to reading since the actual story glosses over this issue. In order to gain an overall perspective of history, students need the details. It returns to a matter of what children are ready to learn and hear.

Wendy Watson's illustrations add that "little something extra" this story needs. With the water color pictures, the pictures often tell more than the words. The Gestapo police linger in the streets, the dogs hover, and the barbed wire fence serves as a barrier between Jews and the outside world. Each picture or set of text is offset and bordered by intersecting lines, much like the barbed wire fences in the ghettos. Still the soft tones used in this story release some of the tensions associated with features of the drawings. Our fear of past horrors, like the Holcaust, should not withhold us from explaining the past to the next generation. They deserve to know.