My students passed Orphan Island around when I first purchased it for my library in 2018, so when I saw that Laurel Snyder was publishing another middle grade novel, I pre-ordered it for my classroom.
I didn’t even look at the description of the book, The Witch of Woodland. All summer it sat on my pile of To Be Read books. I finally read it at the beginning of this school year. I was surprised to find out that it is a mirror for me (Rudine Sims Bishop). No, I am not a witch. I was raised in a Jewish family and had a Bat Mitzvah, like Zipporah (Zippy) Chava McConnell, at age 12. Our names are even similar because in Hebrew, I am Devorah Chava. When I was a 12 years old the only books with Jewish characters were the Diary of Anne Frank or The Chosen by Chaim Potok. They were hardly relatable characters. They were about World War II. Though I was interested in learning about the Holocaust as a middle school student, I didn’t know there were books about modern Jewish kids living in America and neither did other kids my age because there weren’t. What I would have done to have a book like this.
Zippy is a girl I would have been friends with when I was in middle school. In Snyder’s book, I was able to see how my students could relate to Zippy as a character who was unsure of what religion she was. She is preparing to have her Bat Mitzvah but she is stuck between two worlds. A Jewish one and a non-Jewish one.
She says, ” ‘Why do I need a bat mitzvah? We aren’t religious and I thought you only got to have a bat mitzvah if you went to Hebrew school all the way through and knew the prayers and everything. I thought it was like a graduation. And I thought we were only like . . . part-time Jews'” (15).
In the small town I live in, this is a very common occurrence for a child to have one parent who was raised in a Jewish family and the other who is Christian, much like Zippy’s dad in the novel. Kids often celebrate a variety of holidays from Christmas and Easter to Passover and Hanukkah. Our town does not have a synagogue or a place for kids to have a Jewish community other than what families create in their homes and their connections with other families in similar situations, so they only know a little and some have never even met a Rabbi
Seeing Zippy’s experience, these feelings are like a mirror for many of my students . I have been excited to share this story with my students. These are the experiences I so wish I had as a child. I think our students and children are so lucky to have such a variety of books that they can see themselves in and also learn about others. I see the reflection of myself preparing for my Bat Mitzvah at age 12 and the memories I have around this Jewish tradition. Snyder brings up the ideas of how at times this tradition feels like it is more for the parents than the kids. Zippy’s mom even says, ” ‘So religious or not, we are Jewish, you are having a bat mitzvah, and that’s the end of it. We’re part of a tradition’ ” (16).
Though the adults in the story might create the space for Zippy to get in touch with her Jewish side, the story focuses on her interest in being a witch. I love how her Rabbi Dan and parents are so patient with her interest in witchery and let her be herself instead of trying to make her someone she isn’t. Their openness is what keeps her working toward her Bat Mitzvah. And that Rabbi Dan allows her to question parts of Judaism, which has always her to trust him.
Zippy’s curiosity about witchery allows her to learn about Jewish mythology and dybbuks as she works to displace a spirit, Miriam, she has met. This relationship is important to Zippy as she is experiencing distance from her best friend Bea, which so often happens in 7th grade as kids test boundaries with their friends.