by Helen Stein Behr (Author) Like most children, Renata Haberer loved the train. The sound of the whistle. The gentle hum of wheels hugging the tracks. Chatting with passengers she did not know. Renata loved it all. But all that changed on an October day in 1940 when German soldiers forced Renata's family and her town's fellow Jews on a different kind of train for a destination unknown. It wasn't just Renata's love of trains that changed that day. Everything she cherished would never be the same. Based on actual events, Renata tells the story of a German girl born as Adolph Hitler comes to power. At first shielded by her parents of Nazi abuses and a world collapsing around them, Renata's facade of a normal childhood begins to crumble with Kristallnacht.