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Puffin For the Ones You Love.
The extraordinary true story of the sisters who saved each other.
Friedel and Gina, twins and best friends, live happy enough lives. Their world is cycling trips, visits to their father’s shops, and first-day-of school excitement.
But this is a world that is about to fall apart.
It is the 1930s, and the Nazis are on the rise across Germany. They hate anyone who is different – anyone who is Jewish.
Friedel and Gina and their family are Jewish, and before long they are forced to journey to Poland, where terrible hardships await in a prison-like ghetto. Soon separated from loved ones, as the Second World War rages around them Friedel and Gina are eventually taken to a Nazi prison camp – a place of danger and fear, where they must do everything they can to survive.
From daring recues to incredible acts of kindness, this is the story of the sisters’ love for each other, and of friendships found in the darkest of places.
Friedel and Gina, twins and best friends, live happy enough lives. Their world is cycling trips, visits to their father’s shops, and first-day-of school excitement.
But this is a world that is about to fall apart.
It is the 1930s, and the Nazis are on the rise across Germany. They hate anyone who is different – anyone who is Jewish.
Friedel and Gina and their family are Jewish, and before long they are forced to journey to Poland, where terrible hardships await in a prison-like ghetto. Soon separated from loved ones, as the Second World War rages around them Friedel and Gina are eventually taken to a Nazi prison camp – a place of danger and fear, where they must do everything they can to survive.
From daring recues to incredible acts of kindness, this is the story of the sisters’ love for each other, and of friendships found in the darkest of places.
336 pages, Paperback
Published August 14, 2025
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
January 4, 2026
This was a harrowing, heartbreaking story that completely captivated me. Being a kids book it was very accessible yet still captured the devastation of the ww2 and the holocaust whilst being manageable for younger readers. This was an important story to tell and one that should be read by everyone.
January 31, 2026
Recording stories like this is so vital, but the writing style let this down. The surfeit of footnotes and the definitions of words within a sentence (e.g. "Mum rouged (reddened) her cheeks") broke up the narrative flow and made it feel more like a history lesson rather than a story about real, relatable people. Facts were directly addressed to the reader, for instance explaining that: "The bar mitzvah is a very serious step for Jewish boys. They study the Jewish religion in preparation for a solemn ceremony in which they are seen as becoming grown-ups in the eyes of God." instead of saying Max had spent hours studying for his bar mitzvah etc. It was weirdly stilted and impersonal, which made it difficult to engage with the story or the characters.
The events in the book span 15 years, so a lot of it was condensed. Although there were details that brought the characters to life and really resonated, there were also a lot of dropped plot threads. Maybe the author didn't have that information and wanted to stick to the facts, but as a reader, the lack of resolution was unsatisfying.
The events in the book span 15 years, so a lot of it was condensed. Although there were details that brought the characters to life and really resonated, there were also a lot of dropped plot threads. Maybe the author didn't have that information and wanted to stick to the facts, but as a reader, the lack of resolution was unsatisfying.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews