It really annoyed me that this book was so historically inaccurate. I felt that it almost makes light of the Holocaust. How does is it that a small boy in a prison could sit by an unguarded fence for a year and not attempt to escape, but instead let his friend into the prison. How is it that neither of these boys figure out what is going on. I mean the smell of burning bodies everyday would have been a big clue. Oh yeah, and how did a small child make it through the selection process in the first place? Almost all children were gassed on arrival by 1943. There are so many good books to read to explain the Holocaust to children. I'm sorry to see that so many kids are wasting their time on this book. A small amount of research would have made this a better book. But the author seems unwilling to let facts get in the way of his story.