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http://mppl.org/services/youth-department/good-books/?list=Sydney+Taylor+Award+for+Jewish+Childrens+Books+Winners%2C+1990-Present&category=awards

List: Sydney Taylor Award for Jewish Childrens Books Winners, 1990-Present


A photo of The tower of life : how Yaffa Eliach rebuilt her town in stories and photographs

The tower of life : how Yaffa Eliach rebuilt her town in stories and photographs

"The story begins with Yaffa Eliach, a spirited young girl who grows up in a vibrant, happy 800-year-old town in Poland, filled with family life and rich traditions. Yaffa's grandmother, who receives a gift of a camera from America, becomes the village photographer, and takes photos of all the family events: weddings, bar mitzvahs, and family gatherings. And on the Jewish New Year, the villagers send photos to their relatives overseas to wish them a "Gut Yontif"! But one dark day, the town is invaded. And quickly the once happy home to 5,000 Jewish people is uprooted. Yaffa survives the war and becomes a Professor of History and America's foremost Holocaust expert. And when President Jimmy Carter invites her to create an exhibit for the new National Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC, she travels around the world hunting down her grandmother's photos taken of people who fled from her beloved town, Eishyshok, along with their stories and memories.

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A photo of Aviva vs. the Dybbuk

Aviva vs. the Dybbuk

A long ago "accident." An isolated girl named Aviva. A community that wants to help, but doesn't know how. And a ghostly dybbuk, that no one but Aviva can see, causing mayhem and mischief that everyone blames on her. That is the setting for this suspenseful novel of a girl who seems to have lost everything, including her best friend Kayla, and a mother who was once vibrant and popular, but who now can't always get out of bed in the morning. As tensions escalate in the Jewish community of Beacon with incidents of vandalism and a swastika carved into new concrete poured near the synagogue, so does the tension grow between Aviva and Kayla and the girls at their school, and so do the actions of the dybbuk grow worse. Could real harm be coming Aviva's way? And is it somehow related to the "accident" that took her father years ago? Aviva vs. the Dybbuk is a compelling, tender story about friendship and community, grief and healing, and one indomitable girl who somehow manages to connect them all.

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A photo of The Passover Guest

The Passover Guest

In Washington, D.C., during the Great Depression, Muriel and her family have no money to prepare the seder meal until a mysterious stranger performs a Passover miracle. Includes notes on the Passover holiday, the Great Depression, and the history of the D.C. Jewish community.

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A photo of How to Find What You're Not Looking For

How to Find What You're Not Looking For

"New historical fiction from a Newbery Honor-winning author about how middle schooler Ariel Goldberg's life changes when her big sister elopes following the 1967 Loving v. Virginia decision, and she's forced to grapple with both her family's prejudice and the antisemitism she experiences, as she defines her own beliefs. Twelve-year-old Ariel Goldberg's life feels like the moment after the final guest leaves the party. Her family's Jewish bakery runs into financial trouble, and her older sister has eloped with a young man from India following the Supreme Court decision that strikes down laws banning interracial marriage. As change becomes Ariel's only constant, she's left to hone something that will be with her always--her own voice."-- Amazon.

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A photo of Aviva vs. the Dybbuk

Aviva vs. the Dybbuk

A long ago "accident." An isolated girl named Aviva. A community that wants to help, but doesn't know how. And a ghostly dybbuk, that no one but Aviva can see, causing mayhem and mischief that everyone blames on her. That is the setting for this suspenseful novel of a girl who seems to have lost everything, including her best friend Kayla, and a mother who was once vibrant and popular, but who now can't always get out of bed in the morning. As tensions escalate in the Jewish community of Beacon with incidents of vandalism and a swastika carved into new concrete poured near the synagogue, so does the tension grow between Aviva and Kayla and the girls at their school, and so do the actions of the dybbuk grow worse. Could real harm be coming Aviva's way? And is it somehow related to the "accident" that took her father years ago? Aviva vs. the Dybbuk is a compelling, tender story about friendship and community, grief and healing, and one indomitable girl who somehow manages to connect them all.

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A photo of Turtle Boy

Turtle Boy

Seventh-grader Will's Bar Mitzvah community service project, visiting an incurably ill older boy in the hospital, leads to a friendship that is life-changing for both them and those around them.

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A photo of The Book Rescuer: How a Mensch from Massachusetts Saved Yiddish Literature for Generations to Come

The Book Rescuer: How a Mensch from Massachusetts Saved Yiddish Literature for Generations to Come

Over the last forty years, Aaron Lansky has jumped into dumpsters, rummaged around musty basements, and crawled through cramped attics. He did all of this in pursuit of a particular kind of treasure, and he's found plenty. Lansky's treasure was any book written in Yiddish, the language of generations of European Jews. When he started looking for Yiddish books, experts estimated there might be about 70,000 still in existence. Since then, the MacArthur Genius Grant recipient has collected close to 1.5 million books, and he's finding more every day.

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A photo of White Bird: A Wonder Story

White Bird: A Wonder Story

Also available in Hoopla. Tells the story of Julian's Grandmére's childhood as she, a Jewish girl, was hidden by a family in a Nazi-occupied French village during World War II and how the boy she once shunned became her savior and best friend.

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A photo of All-of-a-Kind Family Hanukkah

All-of-a-Kind Family Hanukkah

In 1912 New York, Gertie feels left out while Mama and her four older sisters cook Hanukkah dinner, but Papa comes home and asks her help with an important task.

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A photo of Sweep: The Story of a Girl and Her Monster

Sweep: The Story of a Girl and Her Monster

Also available in Overdrive. In nineteenth-century England, after her father's disappearance Nan Sparrow, ten, works as a "climbing boy," aiding chimney sweeps, but when her most treasured possessions end up in a fireplace, she unwittingly creates a golem.--

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A photo of The Language of Angels: A Story About the Reinvention of Hebrew

The Language of Angels: A Story About the Reinvention of Hebrew

Once there was a child without a friend. Ben-Zion's father insisted that his son speak only Hebrew, considered by some as the language of angels. But in the 1880s, the Jewish people who lived in Jerusalem spoke Yiddish or the languages of the places where they grew up. Hebrew hadn't been in everyday use for more than two thousand years, and adults said it could never be revived.

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A photo of Refugee

Refugee

Also available in Overdrive. Although separated by continents and decades, Josef, a Jewish boy living in 1930s Nazi Germany; Isabel, a Cuban girl trying to escape the riots and unrest plaguing her country in 1994; and Mahmoud, a Syrian boy in 2015 whose homeland is torn apart by violence and destruction, embark on harrowing journeys in search of refuge, discovering shocking connections that tie their stories together.

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A photo of I Dissent: Ruth Bader Ginsburg Makes Her Mark

I Dissent: Ruth Bader Ginsburg Makes Her Mark

Also available in Overdrive. Traces the achievements of the celebrated Supreme Court justice through the lens of her many famous acts of civil disagreement against inequality, unfair treatment, and human rights injustice.

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A photo of Ketzel, The Cat Who Composed

Ketzel, The Cat Who Composed

"Moshe Cotel was a composer who lived in a noisy building on a noisy street in a noisy city. But Moshe didn't mind. Everything he heard was music to his ears. One day, while out for a walk, he heard a small, sad sound that he'd never heard before. It was a tiny kitten! "Come on, little Ketzel," Moshe said, "I will take you home and we will make beautiful music together." And they did--in a most surprising way. Inspired by a true story, Lesléa Newman and Amy June Bates craft an engaging tale of a creative man and the beloved cat who brings unexpected sweet notes his way."--Amazon website.

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A photo of Adam and Thomas

Adam and Thomas

Also available in Overdrive. Adam and Thomas, two nine-year-old Jewish boys who survive World War II, take refuge in the forest where they learn to forage and survive, soon meeting and helping other fugitives fleeing for their lives.

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A photo of My Grandfather's Coat

My Grandfather's Coat

A tailor's very old overcoat is recycled numerous times over the years into a variety of garments and other uses.

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A photo of The Blessing Cup

The Blessing Cup

A single china cup from a tea set left behind when Jews were forced to leave Russia helps hold a family together through generations of living in America, reminding them of the most important things in life.

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A photo of Gathering Sparks

Gathering Sparks

A grandfather introduces his grandson to the Jewish tradition of tikkun olam, a centuries-old concept which proposes that everyone must do their part in order to improve the world.

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A photo of Hereville: How Mirka Got Her Sword

Hereville: How Mirka Got Her Sword

Eleven-year-old Mirka Herschberg dreams of fighting dragons and spends her days honing her skills, even though there are no dragons in her Orthodox Jewish community, but when she accepts a challenge from a mysterious witch, Mirka just mightwin her dragon-fighting sword after all.

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A photo of New Year at the Pier: A Rosh Hashanah Story

New Year at the Pier: A Rosh Hashanah Story

On Rosh Hashanah, Izzy and his family make lists of the wrongs they have committed over the past year, and after they have apologized, they throw pieces of bread into the water to "clean their hearts" in a ceremony called tashlich.

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A photo of The importance of wings

The importance of wings

Also available in Hoopla. Although she longs to be an all-American girl, Roxanne, a timid, Israeli-born thirteen-year-old who idolizes Wonder Woman, begins to see things differently when the supremely confident Liat, also from Israel, moves into the "cursed house" next door and they become friends.

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A photo of Tropical Secrets: Holocaust Refugees in Cuba

Tropical Secrets: Holocaust Refugees in Cuba

Escaping from Nazi Germany to Cuba in 1939, a young Jewish refugee dreams of finding his parents again, befriends a local girl with painful secrets of her own, and discovers that the Nazi darkness is never far away.

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A photo of Hanukkah at Valley Forge

Hanukkah at Valley Forge

During the Revolutionary War, a Jewish soldier from Poland lights the menorah on the first night of Hanukkah and tells General George Washington the story of the Maccabees and the miracle that Hanukkah celebrates. Based on factual events.

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A photo of Confessions of a Closet Catholic

Confessions of a Closet Catholic

To be more like her best friend, eleven-year-old Justine decides to give up Judaism to become Catholic, but after her beloved, religious grandmother dies, she realizes that she needs to seek her own way of being Jewish.

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A photo of Bagels from Benny

Bagels from Benny

Also available in Hoopla. Benny loves to help out at his grandpa's bakery in the morning, and the customers love the crusty bagels with their soft insides. When Grandpa explains to Benny that God, not him, should be thanked for the wonderful bagels, Benny sets out to do just that. He decides to leave God a bagful of bagels in the synagogue at the end of each week. And each week God eats the bagels --- or so Benny thinks ...

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A photo of Hana's Suitcase: A True Story

Hana's Suitcase: A True Story

Also available in Hoopla. A biography of a Czech girl who died in the Holocaust, told in alternating chapters with an account of how the curator of a Japanese Holocaust center learned about her life after Hana's suitcase was sent to her.

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A photo of Stones in Water

Stones in Water

After being taken by German soldiers from a local movie theater along with other Italian boys including his Jewish friend, Roberto is forced to work in Germany, escapes into the Ukrainian winter, before desperately trying to make his way back home to Venice.

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A photo of When Zaydeh Danced on Eldridge Street

When Zaydeh Danced on Eldridge Street

While staying with her grandparents in New York City in the mid-1930s, eight-year-old Zeesie joins in the celebration of Simchat Torah and sees a different side of her stern grandfather.

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A photo of Star of Fear, Star of Hope

Star of Fear, Star of Hope

Nine-year-old Helen is confused by the disappearance of her Jewish friend during the German occupation of Paris.

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A photo of The Always Prayer Shawl

The Always Prayer Shawl

A prayer shawl is handed down from grandfather to grandson in this story of Jewish tradition and the passage of generations.

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A photo of Letters from Rifka

Letters from Rifka

In letters to her cousin, a young Jewish girl chronicles her family's flight from Russia in 1919 and her own experiences when she must be left in Belgium for a while when the others emigrate to America.

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A photo of The Chanukkah Guest

The Chanukkah Guest

On the first night of Chanukkah, Old Bear wanders into Bubba Brayna's house and receives a delicious helping of potato latkes when she mistakes him for the rabbi.

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