The human toll exacted by the Israeli government's 2005 "disengagement" from the Gaza Strip's bloc of Jewish settlements is difficult to understand without a personal account. This one, written in fictionalized form by a teenager for a teenage audience, is a good start. The author is able, despite what must be profound personal pain, to convey the events leading up to the evacuation in a gentle fashion. She focuses on life "before" much in the same way that Holocaust literature for teens focuses on the vibrancy of the European Jewish communities that were later decimated. Her narrative, of course, continues into the difficult days of leaving the only home she had ever known. The story is a bearable way for young readers to begin understanding an indescribable moment in Jewish/Israeli history, and I would encourage them to continue learning about it through other first-hand sources.

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