Five Stories

by Ellen Weinstein

Overview

Five children, from five different cultures and in five different decades, grow up in the same building on the Lower East Side of New York City.

Jenny Epstein and her family arrive on a steamship from Russia in the 1910s. Jenny writes letters in Yiddish to her grandmother, while practicing her English in her new neighborhood. By the 1930s, when Anna Cozzi and her Italian family move into the building, Jenny has become a teacher in Anna’s school. Then José Marte moves in during the 1960s, Maria Torres in the 1980s, and Wei Yei in the Lower East Side of today.

Perfect for early elementary students, this cross section of American history celebrates themany diverse cultures that make up our nation—from the food we eat, to the ways we worship,and the families we love.

A Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781430145608
Publisher:	Live Oak Media
Publication date:	09/01/2024
Series:	Live Oak Media eReadalong
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	32
Age Range:	7 - 8 Years

About the Author

Ellen Weinstein is the illustrator of the picture book Yayoi Kusama: From Here to Infinity. Ellen is a third-generation resident of New York's Lower East Side, where she lives with her husband and mini-dachshund, Fritzie.

Editorial Reviews

"[A] vibrant celebration of immigrants and the multicultural richness of New York City."—The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books

"Tantalizing glimpses of a diverse neighborhood’s cultures and origins, with insight into the commonality that underlies them."—Kirkus Reviews

"Wein­stein has dis­tilled the essence of New York city life, and has also giv­en five indi­vid­ual sto­ries their own unique space.”—Jewish Book Council

From the Publisher

2024-01-05
Successive generations of children in the same Lower East Side tenement map out a common immigrant experience in New York City.

Using the term stories in both senses of the word, Weinstein opens with a cutaway view of the building that shows one of the five families on each floor. She then introduces Jenny Epstein, her actual grandmother, who in 1914 moved with her Russian Jewish family into the building, where they lived above a pickle store. Four fictive young recent arrivals follow from Italy (1932), the Dominican Republic (1965), Puerto Rico (1989), and China (“Today”). The text offers mere snapshots, too short to include more than a few common concerns or details of daily life (though to link the generations, each child mentions knowing the inhabitant of the floor below). But the illustrations are filled with lavish period details, both of domestic furnishings inside and dress, cars, and changing shop signs outside. “Hosiery” becomes “Sportswear,” “Latticini” makes way for “Bodega,” Chinese characters appear, and other businesses come and go—except for the pickle place, which remains as a visual anchor while adding mango, okra, and kimchi to its advertised wares by the end. Weinstein also tracks a growing diversity of people as well as food, while in her afterword she properly acknowledges that her five families can only suggest how rich the community’s real racial and cultural mix is.

Tantalizing glimpses of a diverse neighborhood’s cultures and origins, with insight into the commonality that underlies them. (Informational picture book. 6-9)

Kirkus Reviews