The Lemon Tree was an excellent adaptation of its original work, it's full of heart and it provides excellent, humanistic perspectives on an issue that students may not be familiar with. I would definitely use it in a unit focusing on perspectives and bias to challenge my students to use their critical thinking skills as they read and discuss the novel.

It is such a heartfelt story about friendship through a shared love for a house with a lemon tree in its backyard. This is such a sweet story that takes place in 1967, but it is still so comprehensible for young readers. I would highly recommend reading this story especially families with young readers. I want my nephews and nieces to read it so much.

I read this a while back, but never posted my thoughts. I think this book is a great introduction to the Israel and Palestinian conflict, and appropriate for a younger audience.

A super important read. A story of friendship and shared struggles, and humanity. But it never felt too heavy especially this edition. Very well done.

This Young Readers' Edition of The Lemon Tree is a beautifully told and captivating narrative of a friendship that transcends political divides. I was worried that this novel would be a little trite after just reading the description, but the bond between Bashir and Dalia is so sincere that it surpasses the saccharine aspects. As a young reader, I had almost no understanding of the conflict between Israel and Palestine, I wish I had had a book like this to help me understand more about the issue.

This was a beautiful yet heart breaking story. Told from different perspectives and so important to read. I have never read anything like it beside and I wish that it had gotten much publicity.

This was a fantastic non-fiction, adapted from the original written for adults. With all the adaptations coming out recently, I am sometimes weary about how the story will be told for a younger reader. I felt this book did a good job of simplifying the situation without dumbing things down for the intended audience (I have not read they original).

Given the historical time period and place, I feel some images/graphics/timelines could be helpful, but overall, great addition to non-fiction.

I appreciate how it brings a huge issue down to a very relatable human scale. So many books on this topic are overwhelming and highly charged... this one feels personable and humane. I appreciate how both the Israeli and Palestinian families are treated by the author with dignity ~ and as complex, layered, people. If you're interested in understanding the conflict in Israel-Palestine, but aren't a historian or politician yourself, this is a great read. And even if you're well versed in the conflict, you'll appreciate the stories of these families as they try and make peace with their own histories, and each other. This is my #1 suggested book to friends and family who want to know why I'm obsessed with this issue.

This book was very good. I think it was a very different and more personal perspective of complicated events in the Middle East. However, I feel like although it’s written for young readers it didn’t read like that.

Novembe1947 brought the UN partition of Israel/Palestine and the international, national and personal repercussions have never ceased. This plot focuses on two families. To make room for the WWII Jewish refugees, Palestinian Bashir's family was unceremoniously ejected from their family home and become refugees in their former country. Everything is left behind. Dalia's family survived the Holocaust and has immigrated to Israel, where they move into Bashir's deserted home when she is a baby. As Dalia grew, she found clues, and began to ask questions, especially about the house with the lemon tree. Who lived here before us? Why did they leave? Where did they go? The consequences of the Palestinian displacement has continued to be in the news and this is an important book offers a stepping stone for understanding.

I have been blessed to visit the Holy Land of Israel (FKA Palestine) three times. Each time, I learn more truth about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. While this review will not share my thoughts on the conflict (considering there are similar conflicts here in America), I will share that this book caused me to re-think my thoughts and positions. Fortunately for me, I have been able to hear various perspectives over the states of Israel/Palestine, the West Bank, Gaza, and much of the conflict in the Middle East, This book has really shifted my perception. Going into this book, I was not expecting this to be a book that challenges my thinking, follows the story of two families, and tell of their history over decades of time. Granted, the synopsis provides a hint of that, but this was not what I was expecting in the best way possible. The Lemon Tree provides the bond/connection of the Khairi's and Eshkenazi's. This is a significant/important read for many.

It took me a few chapters to really get hooked on this book. I’m not very familiar with the history of Israel, so I had to read some parts more than once to keep things straight in my head.

Once I started to get to know Dalia and Bashir, I really began to invest in the story. I love that the book follows both of their lives and often lets them tell the story themselves. There are some really moving and hopeful moments, but there are some really tragic and heartbreaking moments, too.

I wish there had been some photos or maps or timelines or other visuals in the book. It’s all narrative, and well-written. I think visuals would have made it easier for me to understand some of what was happening, and I would have loved to have seen photos of Dalia and Bashir and the house.

On the whole, I really enjoyed THE LEMON TREE, and I’m so glad I read it. I hope to share this book with others, too. I think it really showed the differences in perspective between Dalia and Bashir and the struggle to be and remain friends in spite and because of their differences and their connections. I feel like we could all use this kind of hopeful story right now.

Note: I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

In 1967, Bashir Al-Khayri, a Palestinian twenty-five-year-old, journeyed to Israel, with the goal of seeing the beloved old stone house, with the lemon tree behind it that he and his family had fled nineteen years earlier. Not knowing what expect, when he found the house he was greeted by Dalia Ashkenazi Landau, a nineteen-year-old Israeli college student, whose family fled Europe for Israel following the Holocaust. Dalia and Bashir began an unlikely friendship, in the aftermath of war and tested over the next thirty-five years in ways that neither could imagine.
The author conducted extensive research for this book and has managed to portray the Israeli-Palestinian conflict down to a human level. Here, even amid the harshest of political realities there exist stories of hope and reconciliation.

This is an excellent work of nonfiction. I like non fiction, but prefer historical fiction. Therefore for this reader I found some of the historical aspects to be a bit tedious.

The Lemon Tree (Young Readers' Edition) // by Sandy Tolan

I choose this book for several reasons. I previously knew next to nothing about the conflict between Palestine and Israel so I wanted to learn about it in order to be able to form my own opinion since I recently became a citizen and am now able to vote in elections that may have an influence on international issues. I also was interested to see how a topic with as much violence as this would be portrayed in a book directed towards young readers. This led me to my next question: What age range is meant by "young readers?" This last question took me on a Google search that resulted in an approximate range of 8-12 years old.

The goal of this book was to take a real-life event, or chain of events in this case, and tell it like a novel. While I do have to say that this book seems very well researched with years of fact-checking by both Palestine and Israeli historians, which makes this an incredible book to read, I cannot say that it does actually feel like a novel. It does not have the same flow as you would expect from a fictional story, which though does not take away from the importance of this book at all. It is incredible to be witness to the relationship between Dalia and Bashir, two people that could not be fundamentally more opposite in their vision for the future.

There are though a lot of sections in this book that may feel rather dry to the targeted age range. I also want to say that I had the feeling - based on the introduction - that the author had the goal of being unbiased throughout the story, telling it from both sides equally. Rereading the intro now though while writing this review I am wondering if maybe I made that up in my head. Either way though, this book does seem just a tad biased towards one side of the conflict, which in turn makes me lean towards that same side as well as I am now in the beginning stages of forming my own opinion on this topic, though I will refrain from saying which side that is.

Overall though, I very much like the way Tolan focused on the two families that revolve around this same house and the way that this story starts and ends around the lemon tree. I think the descriptions of the violence were done appropriately for the targeted age group, relaying the devastation and tragedy without going into too much gruesome detail. This seems like a great introduction to this topic for readers of all ages that can lead each person to their own next questions to research.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with a free copy in exchange for an honest review.

What an excellent story, offering readers some of the complicated history and building off of this by focusing on one complicated friendship between two people, and their families. I have not read the original publication, but I can speak to the adaptation. It felt like a very appropriate book to introduce a complex upheaval that is often not spoken of at all. Thanks to Netgalley and Bloomsbury Publishing PLC for the free e-arc.

Good read giving insight to the ancient rivalry between Israel and Palestine. It did not give any pat answers, only that it is a very difficult dilemma for everyone caught in that era and generation. It got a little long on historical context for young readers with not enough story telling to keep them interested, in my opinion. It gave me a better idea of what is going on when I see these areas in the news.

Tolan's symbol of the Lemon Tree is what we need more of in the world today. The Lemon Tree sheds light on religious divides between the Palestinians and Israelis in the 1960's. I did find the timeline a bit hard to follow. Because of the timeline, as a teacher a lot of background information would be required to dive deep into conversations however, I feel that with the right scaffolding, the students could easily draw parallels to current events.

Thank you to #NetGalley and Bloomsbury USA Children's Books for the opportunity to read a digital ARC of The Lemon Tree (Young Reader's Edition): An Arab, A Jew, and the Heart of the Middle East by Sandy Tolan.

This is a middle grade adaptation of an award-winning adult book about a human story behind the conflict in the Middle East. It is the story of Bashir Khairi, a 25-year-old Palestinian, who traveled to Israel with the goal of seeing his childhood home and of Dalia Eshkenazi Landau, the 19-year-old Israeli college student, whose family fled Europe for Israel following the Holocaust. They are connected by a shared home and a lemon tree. The two develop a tenuous friendship that highlights the human side of the conflict in the region.

This is a powerful story. It is a middle grade adaptation and is written in a narrative style, but there is still a lot for the reader to process. I worry that younger readers may miss the severity and nuance of the situation. Though a narrative style is used to tell this completely true story, it doesn't move with a quick pace. Rather, it is measured and not a quick a read. It will take time for a middle grades reader to work through and fully appreciate it. The timelines also change without much notice which can sometimes be confusing and a little jolting. I do think this is an important book and that it should be included in classroom libraries as it talks about a region and history that is often overlooked in the traditional US school system. With support, I think this would be an excellent book to use in social studies courses and that it could be the catalyst of some great discussions.

This is a really important story that needs to be told. I have never really been able to understand the complexities of Israel v Palestine and The Lemon Tree helped put a lot of things in perspective. This is a great book for teens to read if they are interested in Middle Eastern politics or if they are taking any class that needs to understand racial/religious divides.

I have not read the adult version of The Lemon Tree so I can't compare it to its original publication, but I really enjoyed this. I knew only basic information about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict before reading this so I found it very informative and easy to read.
My biggest critique of this book is that the background to the conflict stretched for longer than I thought it should have before delving back into specifically Dalia and Bashir's friendship. While I think the backstory was important, I think that the timeline should have flipped back and forth more often than the giant chunk of backstory that took place just after Bashir and his brothers first arrived at the house. I found it a bit disjointed and I imagine a younger reader (who the book was primarily meant for) would feel the same.
I liked that the story kept alluding back to the lemon tree and all that it stood for. I think this book was a fantastic way for young readers to learn about this conflict and from two very different perspectives on it, which is so important. I would like to see more books like this for young audiences in the future.