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Staff Picks

Rocco recommends When the World was Ours by Liz Kessler

07/03/2025

Boulder Library

historical fiction, friendship, juvenile fiction, .Teen Picks, Rocco, 12th Grade

Cover Art

Beautiful book, but most definitely not for the faint of heart, it describes the struggles of the Jewish children living in Vienna in 1936 when Nazi influence was on the rise. When the World was Ours is a great way to get an in depth perspective on each child’s experience. Absolutely love this book, it was my favorite for quite a while, but I wouldn’t recommend it to younger people, or anyone with sensitivities towards violence and child abuse. This book is pretty dark and has some heavy subjects like death and Nazis, but I do feel it’s important that youths read it.

Publisher's description:

Vienna. 1936. Three young friends—Leo, Elsa, and Max—spend a perfect day together, unaware that around them Europe is descending into a growing darkness and that they will soon be cruelly ripped apart from one another. With their lives taking them across Europe—to Germany, England, Prague, and Poland—will they ever find their way back to one another? Will they want to?

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