Historical Reading Book Pairs: Various Topics

Eel, an orphan, and his best friend Florrie must help Dr. John Snow prove that cholera is spread through water, and not poisonous air, when an epidemic sweeps across their London neighborhood in 1854.

An introduction to cholera that explains what it is, how it spreads, what its symptoms and treatment are, how it has impacted human history, and what can be done to stop it.

John Bul Dau and his wife, Martha, describe the hardships they experienced, including violence, famine, and war, while growing up in the Sudan and explain how they escaped the region to start a new life.

When the Sudanese civil war reaches his village in 1985, eleven-year-old Salva becomes separated from his family and must walk with other Dinka tribe members through southern Sudan, Ethiopia, and Kenya in search of safe haven. Based on the life of Salva Dut, who, after emigrating to America in 1996, began a project to dig water wells in Sudan.

Examines the lives of children living in Kabul, featuring boys and girls ages ten to seventeen discussing their lives in a country at war.

Because the Taliban rulers of Kabul, Afghanistan, impose strict limitations on women's freedom and behavior, eleven-year-old Parvana must disguise herself as a boy so that her family can survive after her father's arrest.

Provides an overview of the Black Death, looking at the conditions that led to the plague, the deaths that occurred because of it, the legacy of the Black Death, and other related topics.

Brind, the huntsman of Dowe Manor, is tossed out of the manor--along with his mastiff Glaive, the foster child Aurelie, and her puppy Gabion--after the landlord's wife dies of the Plague, and together the small group goes in search of safety in a land filled with the Black Death.

An introduction to the plague in Europe and Asia during the fourteenth century that discusses pestilence, infection, its emergence, the three pandemics, causes, how it affected humanity, and other related topics.

Ann Fay Honeycutt becomes the man of the house at age thirteen after her father leaves to fight in World War II, forcing Ann to give up her childhood and tend to her family, but when a polio epidemic strikes, Ann faces the most devastating challenge of her life.

An introduction to polio that discusses different types of polio infections, the virus's history, how it has affected families and society, the development of a vaccine, and programs designed to eradicate it worldwide.

In 1919, independent-minded fifteen-year-old Rosalind lives in India with her English parents, and when they fear she has fallen in with some rebellious types who believe in Indian self-government, she is sent "home" to London, where she has never been before and where her older brother died, to stay with her two aunts.

Combines historical information with biographical sketches, illustrations, photographs, primary source excerpts, and first-person narratives to examine the Indian Independence Act of 1947 and its implications.

Infatuated with army life, fifteen-year-old Richard Fuller enlists using an assumed name, travels to England, witnesses the terror of the Battle of Britain and the death of a German pilot, is caught in the London Blitzkrieg, and is wounded, and when his true age is discovered, he faces a possible court martial.

Examines the Battle of Britain and Winston Churchill's role in it.

A collection of essays that profile women, events, and legislation that have had a serious impact on women's rights and freedom in the United States.

In central Texas in 1899, eleven-year-old Callie Vee Tate is instructed to be a lady by her mother, learns about love from the older three of her six brothers, and studies the natural world with her grandfather, the latter of which leads to an important discovery.

Traces women's struggle for rights in America from the colonial period to the 1990s.

Nawuth Keat, a survivor of the Khmer Rouge invasion of Cambodia, describes his experiences, discussing the killings of his family members, his enslavement, the relationships that were formed between people from his community, and more.

After the Communists take over Cambodia and her family is torn from their city life, twelve-year-old Nakri and her older sister attempt to maintain their hope as well as their classical dancing skills in the midst of their struggle to survive.

When soldiers arrive in his hometown in Cambodia, Arn Chorn Pond is separated from his family and sent to a labor camp, where he works in the rice paddies until he volunteers to learn to play an instrument--a decision that both saves his life and lands him in battle.

Asa Coppermane, daughter of a Viking chief, is anxious to help her people during a particularly difficult winter, but when Jorgen, the clan's wise man, tells her she must kill her beloved horse Rune for food, she runs away and finds shelter with a mysterious old woman who seems to have a strange power.

An Anglo-Saxon girl saves her village from Viking invaders and herself from an arranged marriage.

Explores the culture of the Vikings through a look at the lives of warrior kings, upper class men and women, farmers and settlers, artisans and artists, merchants and traders, warriors, poets and rune masters, and slaves, and explains how historians learn about ancient civilizations.