Young Readers Edition / Irena's Children

Irena's Children

September 1, 1939
The wail of sirens dragged Irena from sleep, and she jumped up. Air-raid sirens. An attack? No. Surely, a false alarm.

She and her mother grabbed their bathrobes and slippers. Everywhere, rumpled neighbors were pouring out of their apartment buildings into the street. They peered upward. It was six o'clock in the morning and the low-lying clouds were calm, the streets empty of traffic. The air-raid wardens knew no more than the curious crowd, but shooed everyone back into their buildings. The anxiety and early hour made people cross, and somewhere in the building a door slammed. The sirens continued to wail.

Irena sat with her mother at the kitchen table and turned on Polish radio. Bleary-eyed and grim, they listened to the news. Everyone feared Germany would strike. Irena and her friends had followed news of Adolf Hitler's rise to power in Germany and the antidemocratic policies of his National Socialist German Workers' Party (Nazi party). The German takeover of Czechoslovakia had moved Poland to ready its military for war. But though Irena had known war would come, it was difficult to believe her country-her city-was under attack!

Hovering over the radio, Irena leaned in to hear the words. Government and city workers in the capital were instructed to stay at their posts around the clock, using all efforts to resist the German aggressors. Thank heavens. Irena wanted to do something.

Irena, stop fidgeting. A look from her mother told her to sit down and finish her coffee. What could she do anyhow? The minutes ticked by. News trickled in. German armies rolled into Poland from the south, the west, and the north.

By 7:00 a.m. Irena could no longer bear doing nothing, and she flew down the stairs to the courtyard. Tossing her weathered bag into the basket of her bicycle, Irena hitched up her skirt and pedaled quickly toward the Old Town and her office on Zlota Street. It was a relief to be off, to leave the

Tilar J. Mazzeo is the New York Times and San Francisco Chronicle bestselling author of books that include The Widow Clicquot, The Secret of Chanel No. 5, and Hotel on the Place Vendôme. The Clara C. Piper Associate Professor of English at Colby College, she divides her time among coastal Maine, New York City, and Saanichton, British Columbia, where she lives with her husband and stepchildren. Mary Cronk Farrell is a former award-winning journalist and author of fiction and nonfiction books for children. She writes with passion about little-known people of history who face great adversity with courage. Her book Pure Grit: How American World War II Nurses Survived Battle and Prison Camp in the Pacific has been named a Notable Social Studies Trade Book for Young People, Jefferson Cup Honor Book, Washington State Book Award Finalist, Booklist Editor's Choice, to the Amelia Bloomer Project List and awarded a EUREKA! Children's Book Award for Excellence in Nonfiction. She lives in Washington State.

"Farrell's adaptation of Mazzeo's adult title (2016) clearly presents [Irena Sendler's] life and the ever present reality of death in a sobering, heartbreaking narrative. Readers will understand how Sendler came to be honored by Israel's Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial as one of the Righteous Among the Nations." Kirkus Reviews