Some of the changes in Eva's life are gradual, but most are sudden and drastic. Swastikas seem to appear everywhere, and there are signs on public benches prohibiting Jews from sitting on them. At school, the curriculum and even the teachers change, and the way Eva is treated also changes. Eva's father can no longer operate his beloved bookstore. Her best friend and members of her family disappear. The community of people who had celebrated her grandfather's birthday can no longer be counted upon for friendship. Arno becomes Eva's confidante, but their shared love of music and budding romance are continually threatened in one way or another. Arno's artist father has been placed in an asylum, and his stepfather has disowned him because he's Jewish. this compelling novel concerns a particular young teenager and her family, her first love, and how she was able to flee Germany. Chronicling local events affecting Jews in a small German town between January 1933 and July 1940, Walk the Dark Streets continues the autobiographical story Baer began in A Frost in the Night: A Girlhood on he Eve of the Third Reich (Pantheon, 1980). In that first work of autobiographical fiction, Eva's comfortable childhood as a cherished child and her family's life are carefully recreated within the general environment of growing dread that is fully realized in Walk the Dark Streets. Both novels are beautifully crafted and offer a perspective on the Holocaust not expressed in other novels for young readers. Baer came to the United States in 1940 when she was in her teens. (Ages 12-16)

A girl's escape from Nazi Germany.

The city Eva Bentheim once adored is no longer familiar. A swastika is emblazoned on the flag atop the City Hall. Teachers, family, and friends are beginning to disappear. Her father seems gone in a different way; he has become ill, fragile, and despondent as the Nazis gain power. When things get worse, Eva's mother desperately tries to obtain the proper papers for her family to leave the country. Then a horrible night of roundups occurs and Eva's father is taken away. A nocturnal search begins for someone who can help release him from the city jail. Eva's boyfriend, Arno, may have a way to save her father from deportation, but it soon becomes clear that their struggles have just begun. Exquisitely felt and written, Walk the Dark Streets resonates with the indomitability of the human spirit even as a loving family's attempts to stay together grow more and more hopeless.
A girl's escape from Nazi Germany.

The city Eva Bentheim once adored is no longer familiar. A swastika is emblazoned on the flag atop the City Hall. Teachers, family, and friends are beginning to disappear. Her father seems gone in a different way; he has become ill, fragile, and despondent as the Nazis gain power. When things get worse, Eva's mother desperately tries to obtain the proper papers for her family to leave the country. Then a horrible night of roundups occurs and Eva's father is taken away. A nocturnal search begins for someone who can help release him from the city jail. Eva's boyfriend, Arno, may have a way to save her father from deportation, but it soon becomes clear that their struggles have just begun. Exquisitely felt and written, Walk the Dark Streets resonates with the indomitability of the human spirit even as a loving family's attempts to stay together grow more and more hopeless.