Historically Speaking

 So many books, so little time is the phrase I think about most at this time of year. Thankfully, another year is fresh on the forefront with new reads. Here are some of my fave historical books from 2022. In all of these books, authors have brought to life places and periods across the globe - from Italian immigrants in turn-of-the-century New York to 1930s Berlin to Africa to the fateful day of September 11, 2001. While they range in place and period, they also range in form. They are told in prose, verse, and graphic novel.  Check them out!  Turn-of-the-century NYC told in prose by Donna Jo Napoli .  A wonderful novel in verse set in Africa from Kwame Alexander Kip Wilson brings 1930s Berlin to life in this young adult novel-in-verse.  All of Don Brown 's graphic novels are chock full of facts and story. 

From the Writer's Almanac:   It was on this day in 1933 that   the  Nazi Party won 44 percent of the vote  in German parliamentary elections , enabling it to join with the Nationalists to gain a slight majority in the Reichstag. Within three weeks, the Nazi-dominated Reichstag passed the Enabling Act, which gave Hitler dictatorial powers and ended the Weimar Republic in Germany. Let's honor the women who worked in the Resistance at that time and during WWII, my family included.  Here are a few books that tell the story of some of those people: