Shu­lamit Frankel grew up in the tumul­tuous years dur­ing the cre­ation of the State of Israel. She shares can­did reflec­tions of her young life as her fam­i­ly nav­i­gates the upheavals of this polit­i­cal land­scape. She delves into the world of her youth, cap­tur­ing details that have long been for­got­ten, such as Ger­man colonies in Pales­tine before WWII and Italy’s bomb­ing of Tel Aviv and Haifa. Shulamit’s sto­ries cov­er a wide gamut of what life was like grow­ing up in a young Tel Aviv, from under­stand­ing the sig­nif­i­cance of the reli­gious fes­ti­vals to dis­cov­er­ing the joys of chew­ing gum. 

Both Shu­lamit and her broth­er fought for the cre­ation of a Jew­ish state. Shu­lamit trained in the Haganah while her broth­er joined the Irgun. Shu­lamit engages us in her family’s deep con­nec­tions of love and loy­al­ty in these dif­fi­cult years. Against the back­ground of his­tor­i­cal events, Shu­lamit recalls the dai­ly tri­als and tribu­la­tions of grow­ing up in a deeply reli­gious fam­i­ly in a mod­ern­iz­ing world, cap­tur­ing the tragedies, tri­umphs, pathos, and humor of the times.