Louder Than Words

In a small Ukrainian town, life is not easy for the Jewish community. Dina’s father has died causing her mom to have to go to work. While she is at work, her mom hires a housekeeper who will also watch Dina and her sisters. One is a baby and Nadia is the “middle” child. Dina likes school yet when she is at school, she gets bullied by a boy because she is Jewish. One day Dina goes home from school earlier than usual and discovers her mom home. Her mom is usually home later. Dina finds out that she has lost her job. She tells the family and housekeeper that Hitler won’t let any Jewish people work. If not for their housekeeper, Nina saves the family when their house is burned down. she has them getting their new papers acting like the mother with the kids her children and Dina’s mother as the housekeeper. One day, Dina’s mother decides to go the market and doesn’t come back. Dina is worried that her mom had an accident or worse. she discovers her mom has been arrested and taken to the ghetto. Dina goes with Nina to look for her mom through the barb wired fence. Will she and her sisters see her mom again? How will Dina and her younger sisters survive? Though this is a sad story, it shows how the family lives during the Nazis arrival and staying to guard the town against the Allies. The Jewish community were treated worse than the lowest forms of life. Fortunately the courage of Nina, the housekeeper gave them a decent life by pretending they were her children. She was very brave as she could be shot.

The author has written an excellent novel showing the differences the the town before and after Hitler’s Nazis occupying the town. The characters are well developed as well as the life of survival against terrible odds. It’s a novel that can be read by anyone not just children. I was amazed by Dina’s loyalty to her younger sisters and Nina after losing her mother.

E ARC provided by Netgalley



Dina and her family are struggling after the death of the schoolteacher father, but luckily their mother has been able to take on his job. She hires a housekeeper, Nina, to watch the baby during the day and help out. It's the early 1940s, and the town of Prokurov, which once was Polish, then Russian, is now part of the Soviet Ukraine. There are troubling signs that the Jewish citizens are going to have difficulties-- there are swastikas on businesses, yellow stars to be sewn onto clothing, and eventually the loss of schools, parks, and livlihoods. After a fire burns down their home, Dina and her family have a small piece of luck-- the local government issues them new identity cards, claiming that Nina is the mother of the girls and their mother is the maid. They are all listed as Catholic, Nina's religion. They get an apartment and a small amount of money, and think that they might be able to survive. When a former neighbor identifies the mother and calls the police, she ends up confined to the ghetto. Nina steps up to take care of the girls and to ride out the war while hiding their identities.

Strengths: This had a lot of good details about what life was like for Jewish people in the days leading up to Nazi occupation, and what it was like to hide and ride out the war instead of being sent to a concentration camp. It's similar to Skrypuch's Don't Tell the Nazis, and the fact that it is based on actual people is fascinating. Canadian writers are my new go-to for books about the Holocaust!

Weaknesses: While I understand what they were trying to do with the cover art (it looks like some WWII posters a bit), it's not necessarily going to appeal to my 8th graders because of the cartoon style. I'll be able to hand sell it with no problems, though.

What I really think: Definitely purchasing; every year I need about 200 books set during WWII for an 8th grade project, and this was a compelling read. It doesn't matter that it is the third in the series, but I am going to go back and investigate the other titles.

I think that this book did a great job of exploring what can be a difficult period of time in history in an age appropriate way. If students in middle school classrooms are interested in learning about history, this would be a great pick for them!

Louder Than Words

by Kathy Kacer

Annick Press Ltd.

Annick Press

Children's Fiction , Historical Fiction


Pub Date 14 Apr 2020


I am reviewing a copy of Louder Than Words through Annick Press and Netgalley:



Life is not easy for Jewish People in the days of World War 2 throughout Europe, and the Ukraine is no different. Twelve year old Dina and her sisters find things getting even harder after their Father dies and there Mother has to work and their Non Jewish housekeeper finds herself caring for the children, trying to keep them safe from the Nazi’s. Dinah and her sisters have to depend on there housekeeper in ways that they could not have imagined when there Mother never comes home from the Marketplace and Dinah learns that her Mother was taken to the Ghetto.


Nina finds herself having to keep these children safe, even obtaining false identity papers for them.


Nina’s (Ludviga Pukas) story is a remarkable true story of how one young woman risked her own life to save the lives of three Children that were not her own, she died in 1984 at at the age of eighty two. In September.1994 ten years after her death she was named Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem in Israel, the highest honor that can be bestowed on a non-Jewish person who saved Jews during the Holocaust.


Nina saved the lives of the Sternick girls even at the risk of her own life, showing us that often the greatest heroes are ordinary people doing extraordinary things.


I would recommend this book for Middle Grade students who like to learn about historical events, and true life heroes.


Louder than Words is worthy of five out of five stars!


Happy Reading!

Louder Than Words by Kathy Kacer is the remarkable true story of one woman's incredible acts of heroism during WWII. As Hitler's army advances towards the Ukraine, a widowed Jewish mother of three daughters knows that she must find work if she is to support her family. Bringing housekeeper Nina into the family is an act that is not initially endorsed by daughter Dina, but Nina quickly proves herself to be a loyal and trusted member of the household. As a Christian, Nina is putting herself at tremendous risk by remaining with the Jewish family, yet remains steadfastly loyal as the horrors of Jewish persecution manifest themselves in the community, and within the family that she has come to think of as her own.

This is a tremendously powerful story that, in my opinion, should be on every middle school's mandatory reading list. Told from the perspective of the young Dina, this is a novel that will stay with you long after the final page has been turned.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Annick Press Ltd. for this ARC.

I thought this was such a great story. I really enjoyed reading it. Once I got started it was hard to put down. I thought the characters and plot were very well written. I liked Dina as the main character. She was a young Jewish girl growing up at the beginning of WWII. We see how the people she once knew and thought trusted turned their backs on them. Before the war a woman named Nina came to the family as a housekeeper and did something extraordinary and continued to help the family when no one else could. Such a great children story.