Books have the power to teach, entertain and offer nuggets of wisdom. This year’s selection of children’s stories is no exception, with common themes including connections we build with our friends, our family and our community during Hanukkah and throughout the year.

There are books that bring to life unlikely friendships, like a bond between a young girl and an octogenarian and the companionship between a boy and 10 golems he creates. Meanwhile, biographies about Florine Stettheimer, a Modernist painter, and Abraham Cahan, the founder of The Jewish Daily Forward, as well as a timely reissue of a classic story about a town banding together to fight hate highlight the importance of building community.

Lastly, relationships among parents, grandparents and children, including in one gentle tale of an interfaith family, are poignantly depicted both at holiday celebrations and in everyday moments that leave an indelible mark on the younger generation.

The Greatest 

By Veera Hiranandani. Illustrated by Vesper Stamper (Random House)

With its vibrant watercolor-and-gouache illustrations, this picture book is Jewish Indian author Veera Hiranandani’s loving ode to her Jewish grandfather. Every week, an unnamed grandfather looks forward to spending Sundays with his three grandchildren, who “act as if he is the greatest grandfather in the world,” even though he insists he is “a simple, ordinary man.” As the seasons change, he shows them how to catch fireflies in a jar, tells a fantastic story as they light the Hanukkah candles and invents a game to play on a rainy day. “Maybe love is like a mirror and it is reflected back and forth until it glows so bright everything is surrounded by that light,” the grandfather wonders. Or maybe he’s simply loved “by the greatest grandchildren in the world.”

Violin of Hope 

By Ella Schwartz. Illustrated by Juliana Oakley (Kar-Ben Publishing)

Each evening, Itzik and Feiga listen to their father play the violin. Some nights, they dance to his “quick and lively” melodies; other nights, they listen quietly as his music grows “slow and sorrowful.” His playing is cut short when Nazi soldiers take away the violin and throw it on a truck with other items belonging to Jewish families. The violin, which “had been silent for years,” is found in a damp cellar, carefully restored and played once again by a Jewish musician in a great concert hall. Evocative imagery adds to the sweet story, inspired by the real-life project Violins of Hope, created by a father-and-son team of luthiers in Israel who repaired violins looted during the Holocaust.

A Party for Florine: Florine Stettheimer and Me 

Written and illustrated by Yevgenia Nayberg (Holiday House)

Florine Stettheimer was a stylish and spirited early 20th century Modernist Jewish painter who hosted artistic salons for figures of the avant-garde movement in her New York City apartment. In this biographical picture book, a young aspiring artist visits a museum where she discovers Stettheimer’s self-portrait looking at her from a gallery wall. Struck by the uncanny resemblance to herself, the narrator imagines what it would be like to have Florine as a friend. When the narrator ventures outside, despite the heavy rain, she sees a world through Stettheimer’s playful eyes as “full of color and full of surprise.” Yevgenia Nayberg’s theatrical and vivid artwork, inspired by Stettheimer’s own work, brings the story to life.

Amazing Abe: How Abraham Cahan’s Newspaper Gave a Voice to Jewish Immigrants 

By Norman H. Finkelstein. Illustrated by Vesper Stamper (Holiday House)

Celebrated children’s author Norman H. Finkelstein, who passed away earlier this year, has created a warm portrayal of the founder of the Yiddish Forverts (The Jewish Daily Forward). Abraham Cahan was more than a journalist. His newspaper, which he founded in 1897, was a lifeline for his readers—Yiddish-speaking immigrants from Eastern Europe—and helped them in a new home that had “New customs. New ways to dress. New ways to think.” Cahan’s own story of emigration from Lithuania, where he had become inspired to advocate for the working class, adds another dimension to this biography, as do Vesper Stamper’s expressive and detailed illustrations of Jewish apartments and bustling neighborhoods in New York City.

Mr. Katz and Me

By Marc Kornblatt. Illustrated by Nanette Regan (Apples & Honey Press)

When Saul Katz, “a tall, wrinkled man with an accent,” first arrives at Sarah’s house to take Hebrew lessons from her father, he and the young girl get off on the wrong foot. Mr. Katz spills hot tea while holding a cup in his trembling hands, and she does not understand why he wants to have a bar mitzvah at the age of 81. But as Sarah begins to understand him and hears his beautiful singing voice, a
friendship blooms. Filled with engaging illustrations—particularly noteworthy is a beautiful spread depicting Saul’s bar mitzvah in a luminous synagogue—the book is inspired by the relationship between the author’s own children and Sol Kleiman, an octogenarian immigrant who arrived from the Soviet Union in the 1980s.

Too Many Golems 

By Jane Yolen. Illustrated by Maya Shleifer (Chronicle Books)

In yet another story of an unconventional friendship, prolific children’s book author Jane Yolen tells a tale of a boy and a passel of friendly clay monsters. The rabbi’s son, 6-year-old Abi—short for Absalom—is always getting in trouble. One day, he takes an old scroll from the synagogue basement and reads the text out loud to practice his Hebrew, but he has no idea that it is an incantation to summon golems. The “ten huge clay men” from Jewish folklore who show up at his doorstep ready to “win every fight” seem scary at first, but Abi remembers his parents’ advice to be a good host and treat strangers with kindness. The golems prove to be good friends who help Abi with his Hebrew lessons and even teach him songs.

Baila the Klopper

By Jennifer Tzivia MacLeod. Illustrated by Shirley Waisman (Kar-Ben Publishing)

Young Baila walks around her shtetl with a klopper, a special door knocker, and sings a song—“Get up! It’s early, but soon will be later. Roll out of bed to serve your Creator!”—to wake everyone for morning prayers. She knocks on the doors of the baker, the carpenter
and the klezmer musician. But when the blacksmith is too tired to rise because of a bad night’s sleep, it is up to Baila to help him and her other sleepy neighbors. This fun book will have kids not only klopping along with bright-eyed, curly-haired Baila, but also appreciating the necessity of allowing adults a good night’s sleep. An author’s note and photos at the end of the book tell the story of real-life kloppers whose job it was to knock on doors with a special wooden mallet and wake men for religious services in Eastern Europe.

Uri and the King of Darkness: A Hanukkah Story

By Nati Bait. Translated by Ilana Kurshan. Illustrated by Carmel Ben Ami (Kalaniot Books)

Israeli author Nati Bait takes the common childhood fear of the dark and shows that there is nothing to be afraid of with a little imagination. Uri and his sister, Shir, wait for their dad to get home in time to light the candles on the first night of Hanukkah. Darkness descends and a heavy rain falls, and the children become increasingly worried that something bad has happened to their father. To protect him, Uri imagines fighting off the King of Darkness and his army, whom he envisions as Greek soldiers “with spear and with shield.” Then the door swings open and their dad walks in holding sweet Hanukkah treats. In the afterword, Bait includes a brief retelling of the successful Jewish rebellion against the Syrian Greek rulers that is commemorated during Hanukkah as well as the blessings before lighting the menorah.

Gingerbread Dreidels 

By Jane Breskin Zalben. Illustrated by Thai My Phuong (Charlesbridge)

Sophie and Max are used to celebrating Christmas and Hanukkah separately. Except this year, both holidays start on December 25! The children worry that Hanukkah and Christmas won’t be the same. “Will we get half the presents?” Max wonders. When both sets of their grandparents arrive, the family gets to baking gingerbread dreidels (author Jane Breskin Zalben includes a recipe), decorating a spruce tree in the backyard and lighting the menorah. Warm illustrations of a loving family and the gentle treatment of interfaith marriage convey the message that it doesn’t really matter when the holidays are celebrated as long as they are spent with loved ones.

The Christmas Menorahs: How a Town Fought Hate 

By Janice Cohn. Illustrated by Bill Farnsworth (Le Chambon Press)

On the third night of Hanukkah in 1993, someone threw a rock through the window of the Schnitzer family’s home in Billings, Mont., where a menorah could be seen. Thousands in the community rallied around the Jewish family by displaying menorahs in their windows in solidarity. The city’s clergy, police and journalists also came together in a show of support to combat a series of antisemitic and racist incidents plaguing the town.

The classic children’s book based on real events, first published 30 years ago, was reissued and expanded in late 2023, and its message could not be timelier. With the rise of antisemitism, the Jewish community needs courageous allies more than ever.

The new edition features background information, a discussion guide, relevant clippings from the Billing Gazette and a 2019 essay from former editor Darrell Ehrlick, who described the steps the newspaper took to combat hate. His greatest hope “is that people do not think because we took a stand in 1993 and gave the Neo-Nazis the boot, that we licked this racist thing and that it could never happen here again,” he writes. “What I think is really important is that people realize that fighting against hate and intolerance is an ongoing battle.”

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Alexandra Lapkin Schwank is a freelance writer for several Jewish publications. She lives with her family in the Boston area.