City of Orphans

By the late 1890s, immigrants were streaming into Ellis Island by the thousands. Brought by famine, persecution, and political instability, and always in search of a better life, they sought work and hope amidst the personal turmoil of leaving a country and culture. In Avi’s City of Orphans, the author presents a family struggling to reconcile the promise of hope that brought them to America with the realities of life in an overpopulated, grimy, corrupt city harboring bigotry and intolerance to outsiders. Though Maks was only two years old when his family emigrated from Denmark, he feels the full weight of his family’s position in society. This is most profoundly felt when his sister is used as a scapegoat for theft at the Waldorf. Crime was rampant in large cities in this era, and immigrants were an easy target for blame. Maks knows it will be a formidable challenge to prove her innocence. Hatred for adoptive citizens is rampant no matter their ethnic background or culture. Maks shares a neighborhood block with migrants from Eastern Europe, Latin America, and Asia. They are all treated with the same disdain by the upper-class citizens of New York. Mama says, “People are freer in America.