The Cage (Holocaust book)

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The Cage (ISBN 068981321X), written by Ruth Minsky Sender, is a true story about the hardship and cruelty of being a Jew during the Holocaust. At the beginning of the book it is 1985 (when the book was written). Riva or Ruth is talking with her daughter Nancy when her mind is taken back in time to Lodz, Poland 1939.

Thirteen year old Riva Minska, her mother, three brothers, and landlord are living in the same house. Soon after, though, the Germans invade Poland. At this time Riva and her family are betrayed by their landlady and robbed of their valuables. Soon the gates of the Lodz ghetto were shut and no one came in, they only went out.

After three years chaos has spread quickly and rapidly through the ghetto. Riva's brother Laibele contracts tuberculosis. Her mother is taken away in a Nazi raid because she looks sick. A little while after her mother's deportation, a social worker tries to find homes for the children who now are without adult supervision. But adoption means the remains of her family will be separated. Riva protests and eventually becomes the sixteen year old legal guardian of her younger brothers, Laibele, Motele, and Moshiele.

In the following years Riva must fight sickness, deportation, and losing hope. In the midst of all of this Laibele is consumed by his disease. Now Riva, Motele, and Moshiele must fight harder than ever to prevent being caught by the Nazis and deported. However, they are eventually rounded up and deported to Auschwitz. On the train to Auschwitz, Motele tells Riva that he will look out for Moshiele and try to remain with the family friends, Berl and Laibish. Motele tells Riva to remain with her friends Karola, and Rifkele.

After spending less then a week in Auschwitz. Riva and her friends, including Rifkele's long lost friend Tola, are deported to Mittlesteine, a labor camp.

In Mittlesteine, Riva makes the most of her friends and a miraculous gift, a pencil. Riva had written poetry before being deported but she had left most of it in Auschwitz. Now she starts writing poetry again. The cruel commandant of the camp finds out about her poetry when Riva is infected with blood poisoning. However the commandant gives Riva a notebook and tells her to continue writing.

Riva and her friends are deported to another labor camp some time after. There she is liberated. Riva returns to Poland only to find that her home has been given to a Polish women. However Riva does find her three older siblings who had escaped to Russia before the war. It is not said what happened to Motele and Moishele, but it is implied that they did not survive.