Uprising by Jennifer A. Nielsen

Uprising is the story of a Polish girl’s experience of World War II, based on the experiences of a real-life teenage resistance fighter.

Uprising by Jennifer A. Nielsen. Scholastic, 2024, 384 pages.

Reading Level: Middle Grades, ages 10-12

Recommended for: ages 10-15

Lidia Durr is only 12 on September 1, 1939, when the German war planes fly over her grandfather’s farm. Thus she became part of history’s most destructive war on the very first day and witnessed her first casualties when the planes started dropping bombs. Her beloved father becomes the next casualty when he signs up for the Polish army—an army that will be defeated and dispersed among German work camps. Her teenage brother Ryszard will soon join the Polish resistance. He knows the stakes from Day One: “Sooner or later, Warsaw will fall. After that we will have to figure out how to live.” To Lidia’s questions he clarified: “I mean, how we live before we die.”

After Warsaw’s fall the family moves back to their house in the city, though it’s soon occupied by the Nazis. Lidia’s mother, with whom she has a long-standing adversarial relationship, wants only to keep her head down and attract no attention, but Lidia is made of sterner stuff. She longs to follow her brother into the resistance, and finally gets her chance—just in time to serve as a messenger during the Warsaw Uprising, in the fall of 1944. The Uprising is doomed to fail, but Lidia eventually escapes and finds her way to America, where she reconciles at last with her mother.

In her author note, Jennifer Nielsen references the life of Lidia Durr Zakrzewski, on whom this novel is based. Many of the events and personalities described in the novel actually happened to this real-life resistance fighter, though some of the characters are merged and chronology nudged forward or back. With so much material to be covered, the novel has more of an episodic format rather than a sustained focus on character development or single conflict, but Lidia’s story is a testament to extraordinary courage in the never-ending fight against evil.

Bottom Line: An absorbing true-to-live tale of extraordinary courage in a time of extreme danger.

Also at Redeemed Reader:

• Reviews: Jennifer A. Nielsen is the author of many books we’ve reviewed, beginning with The False Prince. Most of her novels are historical fiction; she visits the French Resistance with Rescue, the Warsaw Ghetto uprising in Resistance, and the Berlin Wall in A Night Divided (starred review).
• Recommendation: We never got around to reviewing it on Redeemed Reader, but one of my favorite books as a child was—and remains—The Silver Sword by Ian Serallier. It’s the story of four Jewish children of Warsaw during the Uprising and after, when they find a way to be reunited with their parents. I call it “the book that made me a reader” and talk about it briefly here.
• Resource: See our “Learning to Lead” booklist with recommendations illustrating the many aspects of leadership.

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