The Island on Bird Street

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The Island on Bird Street (ISBN 0395338875) is a 1985 semi-autobiographical children's book by Israeli author Uri Orlev, which tells the story of a young boy, Alex, and his struggle to survive alone in a ghetto during World War II. The author received the 1996 Hans Christian Andersen Award for children's literature, largely for this book, which was translated into numerous languages and adapted into a play and a film (this story was originally written in Hebrew).

[edit] Plot Summary

In the book, Alex, a jewish boy, hides in the ruins of a house in the ghetto after its inhabitants have been forced out by the germans, leaving all their possessions behind. His Father was taken by the Germans, and he is sent to #78 Bird Street until his father gets him. He meets a girl named Stashya and grows so fond of her that he secretly visits the polish side to go out on "dates" with her.They go ice skatig for their first date. He soon finds out that just like him, she is Jewish, but unlike him she is hiding it and pretending to be polish. Alex and Stashya communicate between themselves using a modified version of Morse Code. After five months, Alex's father comes to rescue him.

Although the ghetto Alex stays in resembles the Warsaw Ghetto, where Orlev himself lived during much of the war, Orlev states in the introduction that Alex's ghetto is fictional.