One Eye Laughing, the Other Eye Weeping: The Diary of Julie Weiss, Vienna, Austria, to New York, 1938 by Barry Denenberg
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I enjoyed the character of Julie because she reminded me a lot of myself at that age (12). She frequently mentions how much she loves to read, and how important books are to her. One quote in particular really jumped out at me:
"I HATE borrowing books from the library. I don't like being compelled to return them by a certain, specified time. . .All last night I imagined I could hear the book loudly ticking away as I tossed and turned, vainly trying to go to sleep.
TICK TOCK, TICK TOCK, READ ME NOW, OR TAKE ME BACK"
As someone who frequently has fines at the library due to keeping things past their due dates - this really resonated with me - as well as making me laugh.
I do question her name, though. Julie does not strike me as an Austrian name. It seems to me a name chosen specifically so that during the story, someone can make fun of her and use her name to point out the fact that she is Jewish by calling her "Jew Lee."
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