Middle+East

=Middle East=


 * 11th Century-Byzantine Empire**

__**Fiction**__ Barrett, Tracy. **//Anna of Byzantium//**. Random House Childrens Books, 2000. In the eleventh century the teenage princess Anna Comnena fights for her birthright, the throne to the Byzantine Empire, which she fears will be taken from her by her younger brother John because he is a boy (Follett Titlewave). Positive reviews. [Denette]


 * 1900's Ottoman Empire**


 * __Fiction__**

Whelan, Gloria. //**Parade of Shadows.**// HarperCollins, 2007. In 1907, sixteen-year-old Julia Hamilton, happy to accompany her diplomat father on a tour of the Ottoman-controlled cities of Istanbul, Damascus, Palmyra, and Aleppo, soon finds the journey increasingly hazardous as she begins to uncover her father's true mission and the secret motivations of the other travelers in their group. (Follett Titlewave). Positive reviews. [Denette]


 * 1960's **


 * __Fiction__**

**1967: Six-Day War** Banks, Lynne Reid. //**One**// **// More // // River ////. //** Barn Owl Books, c2007. (Revised edition). This book tells the story of a rich Jewish fourteen-year old girl whose parents move from Canada to a kibbutz in Israel just before the outbreak of the Six-Day War in 1967. Lesley has great difficulty trying to adapt to her new life. One bright spot is her growing friendship with Mustapha, an Arab boy. 780L [Mary Ann]


 * 1970's: Qaddafi's rule**

__**Fiction**__

Matar, Hisham. **//In the Country of Men//**. Dial Books, 2007. A novel about the love and relationship between nine-year-old Suleiman and his mother in the midst of the political turmoil of Libya under the dictatorship of Qaddafi in the 1970s.(Children's Plus Inc.) 2007 Library Journal Best books of the Year. [Denette]

**1980-1987 (1987 Saddam Hussein's attack)**


 * __Fiction__**

Mead, Alice. //**Dawn and Dusk**//. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007. From NCSS: Thirteen-year-old Azad attempts to lead a normal life in Sardasht in the Islamic Republic of Iran - until 1987, when neighboring Iraq's Saddam Hussein unleashes chemical weapons on Azad's Kurdish Town. Library Media Connection (October 2007) writes, "While Saddam Hussein's plan for genocide for the Kurds has been a topic of discussion, little has been written for young readers. Alice Mead does much to not only shed light on what the Kurds went through in the Middle East, but also creates a believable teen main character." [Colleen]

Moshiri, Farnoosh. **//The Bathhouse.//** Black Heron Press, 2001. A seventeen-year-old girl experiences humiliation, torture, and the constant fear of death when she is arrested because of her brother's involvement with revolutionary leftists in Iran in the 1980s, and is kept prisoner in a bathhouse with several other women (Follett Titlewave). Booklist starred. [Denette]

= =
 * Israeli/Palestinian Conflict**

__Fiction__

Zenatti, Valerie. **//A Bottle in the Gaza Sea//.** Bloomsbury, 2008. Seventeen year-old, Tal Levine of Jerusalem, despondent over the Arab-Israeli conflict, puts her hope for peace in a bottle and asks her brother, a military nurse in the Gaza strip to toss it into the sea, leading ultimately to friendship and understanding between her and an "enemy" (Follett Titlewave). [Denette]


 * Post September 11, 2001**

__**Fiction**__

Staples, Suzanne Fisher. **//Under the Persimmon Tree//**. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005. This timely portrayal of Afghanistan in the months following September 11. The author alternately expresses the views of two survivors: young Najmah, a villager living in the Kunduz Hills, and Nusrat, the American wife of an Afghan doctor. After her mother and newborn brother are killed by a bomb, Najmah travels with neighbors headed for the Pakistan border. Disguised as a boy, Najmah endures a harrowing journey to the edge of Afghanistan, where she parts from her companions to cross the border on her own, determined to find her father and older brother, who have been conscripted by the Taliban army. Meanwhile, in Pakistan, Nusrat anxiously awaits news of her husband, who left home to run a clinic for war victims. The paths of the two protagonists cross when Najmah is brought to Nusrat's school for refugees (which is held under a persimmon tree). 1010L [Jan]

Kass, Pnina Moed. **//Real Time: A Novel.//** Clarion Books, c2004. This novel is a minute-by minute account of a terrorist bombing in Jerusalem. The book follows a cast of characters through the day of the bombing and its aftermath. One is a German teen who has traveled to Israel to research what his grandfather, a Nazi officer, did during the WWII. Another is a Palestinian teen recruited to be a suicide bomber. Others include a holocaust survivor and a Palestinian doctor. 640L [Mary Ann]


 * 2003 War in Iraq **

__**Fiction**__

Myers, Walter Dean. **//Sunrise Over Fallujah//**. Scholastic Press, 2008. Robin Perry, from Harlem, is sent to Iraq in 2003 as a member of the Civilian Affairs Battalion, and his time there profoundly changes him. (Follett Titlewave). Notable Books for a Global Society 2009, Notable Social Studies Trade Books for Young People 2009. 780L [Denette]

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