"Cockroaches, disperse!" yell the correction officers, counting bodies to make sure everyone's alive and accounted for. Here, there's unappetizing food, no air conditioning, and no idea how long one might be here. There's cigarette smoke everywhere. There are kids sleeping in class, and getting thrown around by COs.

This is Rikers Island Prison Complex. Hell for teen detainees.

Martin has nearly forgotten his real name is, which he only hears from his mother and lawyer. Otherwise, the boy is known by his cell, #40. Martin doesn't experience too much human touch in this bleak jail; he's supposed to do what he's told when he's ordered to do it. Not many who reside here have been convicted, but all are treated like the scum on the bottom of your shoe.

People do have a smidgen of hope and a certain lightness on the way to the courthouse, but all that mirth dissipates by the time they trudge back to the bus that returns them to their cages. High school in this setting means being chained to desks and attempting to avoid rival gangs. At some point, Martin wishes to return to the life he recalls as being his own before his legal mess occurred.

Rikers High by Paul Volponi, 2010

The author taught juveniles on Rikers Island for six years in the 1990s, which very much lends his novel an authentic voice and experience. Today, juveniles are no longer housed on the island.

Books about Rikers Island

Paul Volponi's website
 

In this non-fiction memoir, we meet Eva Mozes, her identical twin sister, Miriam, their two older sisters, and their parents, living in Romania in the 1940s. Talk of Hitler and his hatred of Jews permeates their lives, hanging a cloud of fear over Eva's head while growing up. The family heard of Jews dying in "work" camps, but did not want to believe it. As Eva and Miriam's 10th birthday approaches, living conditions get progressively worse in their small town. Kids taunt them and beat them up regularly. Nazis are stationed outside their home, and soldiers' threatening presence was always felt. 

One day in 1944, the Nazis order the family to vacate their home. When they arrive in Auschwitz, the twins are separated from their family, to suffer experiments from the evil, infamous Dr. Mengele. The rest of the family is sent to the Nazis' gas chambers. Eva sees so much death, destruction, and suffering around her, but was determined to ensure her survival and the survival of her twin.

Every day, the many pairs of twins were examined by Mengele and his staff, given shots, and then transported to the infirmary where food and water were withheld. Every night, Eva had to avert death, and was lucky that a nurse and a friend's parent began to smuggle food to her. When she was able to return to the twins' barracks, her sister's condition had deteriorated. Eva is able to get food for her sister and cheer her up. The two needed each other to survive; if one died, the other would be killed. More than that, as twins, they were a part of each other.

Surviving the Angel of Death: The Story of a Mengele Twin in Auschwitz by Eva Mozes Kor and Lisa Buccieri, 2019

Eva Kor died July 2019, and spent her life speaking to groups about the horrors of the Holocaust. She believed in the power of forgiveness and letting go of anger. She was an amazing force in American history.

Books about twins

Books about Josef Mengele

candlesholocaustmuseum.org