A Night Divided

Jennifer Nielsen is an American author of primarily middle-grade fiction. She was born and raised in Utah. She is a practicing member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS). She is best known for her Ascendance series, a set of fantasy novels for young readers. The first book in the series, The False Prince, was published in 2012. It received largely positive reviews and was named a New York Times Notable Children’s Book that same year. Nielsen’s other series include the Mark of the Thief series, works of historical fiction set in ancient Rome and containing elements of fantasy, and The Traitor’s Game, a fantasy series. In addition to A Night Divided, Nielsen has published several works of historical fiction for young readers, including Resistance, which tells the story of a teenager living in Nazi-occupied Poland; and Lines of Courage, which is set during World War I and is told from the perspective of different children living in different countries affected by the war. Nielsen has received numerous prizes for her work, including the Sydney Taylor Notable Book Award and multiple Whitney Awards, which are awarded annually to LDS authors. Nielsen currently lives with her family in Utah.

A Night Divided is set in East Berlin in the years following the rise of the Berlin Wall, a barrier constructed around West Berlin to separate it from East Berlin and the German Democratic Republic (GDR), a communist state. It was raised in 1961 with the primary aim of keeping East Germans from fleeing to West Germany. Prior to the wall’s construction, millions of East Germans defected to the west, finding ways around the post-World War II-era emigration restrictions placed on countries in the Eastern Bloc (the Soviet Union and its satellite states) in order to prevent so-called “Brain Drain”—many emigrants were young and well educated, and East Germany faced severe damage to its economy and its political credibility as a result of the disproportionate numbers of professionals and other skilled workers who fled the country during the pre-Wall period of unrestricted emigration. After the Berlin Wall was raised in August of 1961, virtually all defections became illegal. Before the Wall was raised, approximately 3.5 million East Germans defected from the GDR, many of them crossing over to West Germany at the dividing line between the cities of West Berlina and East Berlin. Between the Wall’s erection in 1961 and its fall in 1989, that number fell drastically: of the approximate 100,000 people who tried to escape, only around 5,000 succeeded, and around 100 failed escapees were murdered by East German authorities.

Jennifer Nielsen has written several other works of historical fiction for middle-grade readers in addition to A Night Divided. Uprising (2024), Nielsen’s latest book, tells the story of a young girl growing up in Nazi-occupied Poland. Iceberg (2023) follows a young English girl named Hazel, who stows away onboard the Titanic and then must fight to survive when the infamous ship hits an iceberg and rapidly begins to sink. Rescue (2021) is set in Nazi-occupied France during World War II. It tells the story of a young girl named Meg who risks her life to undertake a dangerous mission to save her father, who is being held in a Nazi prisoner camp.  Other works of historical fiction about the Berlin Wall and written for young readers include Escape from East Berlin by Andy Marino, which features two separate timelines, one in 1961 (the year the wall is raised) and 1989 (the year the wall falls) told from the perspective of two young people growing up in East Berlin. Cloud and Wallfish by Anne Nesbet is an espionage thriller set during the final days of the Cold War. It follows a young American boy named Noah whose parents—under decidedly mysterious circumstances—whisk him away from his home and resettle the family East Berlin.