The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain

Peter Sís grew up in Prague drawing pictures of tanks and rockets because that was what good Young Pioneers drew. His Caldecott Honor picture book maps that childhood in layers — red-ink propaganda on one page, secret dreamscapes of Western rock music and blue jeans on the next. The Berlin Wall runs through it all, dividing not just a city but an imagination. When the Wall falls in 1989, his illustrations explode into color. For young readers visiting Berlin's East Side Gallery or Bernauer Straße memorial, this book makes the concrete real.