In Maya’s Journey: A Story of Two Great-Grandmothers, we meet Maya, a young girl who loves to write creative stories. However, she’s stumped when her teacher assigns the class to write about their families. Writing nonfiction about actual relatives is an entirely different experience, and Maya finds it challenging. Maya’s parents help by sharing the histories of her two great-grandmothers, Martha and Essie.
Martha grew up in Arkansas, leaving the segregation of the South to move to California, where Black and white children were able to play together. A talented musician, she loved playing the piano and singing with family and friends. Maya’s great-grandmother Essie also loved performing and laughter, and also endured persecution. She left Romania and antisemitism to come to America, where she helped other immigrants adjust to their new home.
Through the stories of her creative great-grandmothers, Maya (and the reader) learns about similarities between people and cultures and how children can be connected to family members whom they have never met. The side-by-side illustrations encourage the reader to compare Martha’s and Essie’s life stories. An author’s note includes more detailed biographies of the women, and a select glossary juxtaposes the language of antisemitism with the language of racism, bringing home the similarities of suffering, prejudice, joy, and triumph experienced by both branches of Maya’s family tree.
Paula Chaiken has worked and volunteered in a variety of capacities in the Jewish world — teaching in religious school, curating at the Spertus Museum, and serving on the boards of her JCC and Temple — for more than twenty-five years. The author of I Know Grandpa (Timber Grove Press, 2015), she also runs a boutique public relations consulting firm.
