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| If I Should Die Before I Wake | 
 enlarge | Author: Han Nolan
Publisher: Harcourt Paperbacks
Category: Book
List Price: $6.95
Buy New: $0.41
You Save: $6.54 (94%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  (82 reviews)
Sales Rank: 263526
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Unknown), English (Published)
Media: Paperback
Reading Level: Young Adult
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 320
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 7 x 5 x 0.9
ISBN: 0152046798
EAN: 9780152046798
ASIN: 0152046798
Publication Date: May 1, 2003
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Hilary hates Jews. As part of a neo-Nazi gang in her town, she's finally found a sense of belonging. But when she's critically injured in an accident, everything changes.
Somehow, in her mind, she has become Chana, a Jewish girl fighting for her own life in the ghettos and concentration camps of World War II.
Han Nolan offers powerful insight into one young woman's survival through the Holocaust and another's journey out of hatred and self-loathing.
Reader's guide and an interview with the author included.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 77 more reviews...
 A Great Holocaust Book. May 19, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
If I Should Die Before I Wake is a thrilling book about hate, murder, and hope. I really enjoyed this book as I got two different views of the Jewish life. This book takes you into different worlds of very different girls trying to find a place in this world. I didn't really enjoy hearing all of the gruesome details that went on in Auschwitz during the Holocaust, but it just made the book even that more interesting.
This book starts by telling you the story of young Hilary, a present day neo-Nazi that is full of hate to her Jewish neighbors. By being in a coma Hilary enters a whole different world, a world belonging to Chana, a Jewish teenager in Poland during World War 2. She must survive the cruel ghetto and stay alive in terrible Auschwitz.
If you want to read a compelling book full of hope and faith this is the book for you. It shows you that in the most horrible of situations you can still find peace and love. Read and see what happens when Hilary's perception of the whole world changes.
 If I should Die Before I Wake October 25, 2006
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
If I Should Die before I Wake by Han Nolan is a heartbreaking novel about a sixteen-year-old named Hilary. Hilary hates Jews. But, as fate would have it, after a terrifying motorcycle accident with her boyfriend, Hilary lies dying in a Jewish hospital. She starts slipping in and out of reality, and is bombarded by dreams from another place, time and person. She becomes Chana, a Polish Jew during the Holocaust. After her father's death at the hands of the Nazis, she gets caught up in a roundup and is transported to the Lodz ghetto with the rest of her family. Many do not survive there, but those who do get sent to the mass gassings of Auschwitz. The scent of death lingers, and Chana can't run or hide from the looming red sky, while Hilary is flung into memories of her shattered past. I really liked this book because it kept switching between the visions of Hilary and Chana. It was also very descriptive and you can see changes in the characters as the story progresses. It's not a very happy book, and so if you want something that will make you cry, this could be a possible outlet for your tears. This story of two broken lives that somehow intertwine despite their differences will teach you so much about strength of character, and strength of heart.
VERY REALISTIC and a great insight into the minds of both Neo-Nazi's and Jews (at the time of WWII) June 17, 2006
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
It is the story of a young teenage girl named Hillary who was speeding on a motorcycle with her boyfriend, Brad, when they "crashed and burned," leaving Brad unharmed, but Hillary inches from death. She was rushed to a Jewish hospital, where she is slipping back and forth through consciousness, unable to contact anyone around her for the time she is in bed.
When she is "unconscious," she is a girl named Chana. Chana is a Jewish girl, living in the years a little before and during the war. While she is Chana, it is only Gestapo members on the streets, beating down the Jews and their pride. Eventually, they are all sent to a Jewish ghetto, where daily life consisted of a body under a 2-story building window, filth, disease, hard manual labor, families of eight to ten living in one room apartments, and more death.
Then later, when the SS lines them all up yet again, she is almost deported, but when not, she escapes in the dead of night. For a time, she is able to pose as a Polish citizen, when someone she used to know rats her out as she gets on a train to be part of a Polish worker round-up, which had meant freedom.
She is then imprisoned until she is sentenced to "hard work" for life, and is sent to Auschwitz. The real Chana survives the war.
During all of this, Hillary sees what the Jews had to go through. She started out in the beginning completely hateful. She is part of a plan that locked up a Jewish boy in one of her schools lockers without food or water for a few days, and her Neo-Nazi group, the Warriors, are about to participate in a huge march.
Her mother also comes into the story, and stays by her bedside as the story progresses, but Hillary's mother, we find out, is another reason she became a Neo-Nazi, as they have had no relationship during her childhood (her dad was her "lifeline"). Then We see Hillary starting to talk (to herself as others stand around her), she reveals that she's had an empty chalky feeling ever since she was five, until Brad came into her life. It was he who influenced her to be recruited into the Warriors. Brad later comes to visit, with constant "Heil Hitler's" and informs her that they are going to torch the hospital, then leaves saying: "You're a hero, Hil. Remember that. You're dying for the cause, White Power! ... Heil Hitler babe. See you in hell."
The fire turns out to fail, and the real Chana herself has just died of cancer as an old woman in the bed next to Hillary, but in was Chana who was able to supernaturally share her past with Hillary. Hillary is now changed, as this has been a very humbling experience.
A truly amazing story June 9, 2006
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
"If I should die before I wake" is a wonderful novel! The book gives you a very good look on the holocaust. It gives you some pretty rough images, but it makes you think and it makes you appreciate freedom. The author worded this book beautifully, almost as if you were there. You can really imagine Hillary and her neo-nazi gang. You can also get a real good feel about Chana and what was going on. This book if for ages 12 and up. I think kids will like this book, if they are a good reader and able to grasp what is going on. Older men and woman will, I think enjoy this bok as well. I am fourteen years old, I love to read and was able to get the jist of the story pretty fast and I loved it. I loved everything, cover to cover. I would recomend this book to anybody willing.
If I should die before I wake April 27, 2006
The book, If I should die before I wake, is about a girl named Hillary who is a neo-Nazi and slips into a comma after getting into a motorcycle accident with her boyfriend. While shes in a comma her mind drifts off into the dream of another persons life. The other life that she enters is a Jewish girl named Chana who is living her life in consentration camps.
The book switches back and forth between Hillary and Chana, telling what is going on in reality and Chana's past. It can get confusing at first but then you know who is talking. The beginning of the book is very interesting. As soon as you start to read it, it grabs your attention and makes you want to read more. The book is very well detailed in exciting and gripping ways. I enjoyed it a lot.
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