Not Nothing: List 3

by Gayle Forman
Twelve-year-old Alex volunteers at a senior living facility and meets 107-year-old Josey, who tells Alex his story of surviving the Holocaust. From this, and with the help of a new friend, Maya-Jade, Alex begins to believe that he can "rise to the occasion" of his own life.

This list covers vocabulary from "Someone To Watch Over Me"–"Talking Points."

Here are links to our lists for the book: List 1, List 2, List 3, List 4, List 5
15 words 13 learners

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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. gnarled
    old and twisted and covered in lines
    I waved him off with a gnarled fist. “She lives across the hall.”
  2. harried
    troubled persistently, especially with petty annoyances
    Earlier that day, when Minna had called her son to say hello, he’d answered with a harried “Mom, what’s wrong?” as if Minna were a problem to be solved, not a person to be loved.
  3. pivotal
    being of crucial importance
    “Yeah,” the boy said. “He’s telling me the story of his life.”
    “Not all my life. Just a few pivotal years.”
  4. retrospect
    contemplation of things past
    Of course, neither the boy nor I knew what he had just saved me from. Much the way that neither you nor I knew that you teaching me to sew or me teaching you German would save both our lives.
    Some things you only know in retrospect.
  5. endearment
    the act of showing affection
    Babci embraced Olka, calling her bubaleh, a Yiddish term of endearment one would use for a relative.
  6. sedative
    a drug that reduces excitability and calms a person
    "And then they made Dickie get into a wheelchair, even though he walks just fine, and pushed him away, and Ginny kept crying and crying and so that awful woman called a nurse and made them give her a sedative and now she’s asleep in her room and it’s…" Here Maya-Jade’s chin trembled. “It’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard.”
  7. divvy
    separate into parts or portions
    Two weeks after the Nazis invaded from the west, the Soviets invaded from the east. Poland became a pie that had been divvied up to be eaten by giants.
  8. vouch
    give supporting evidence
    “I have many German associates who will vouch for us.”
  9. curfew
    an order that after a certain time activities are prohibited
    One night, Father pulled me aside. "Jozef, I need you to do something," he whispered. "Go to the store, after dark but before curfew..."
  10. cache
    a secret store of valuables or money
    "In my office I keep a cache of money in the safe....Grab what you can.”
  11. clientele
    customers collectively
    Our clientele were the well-heeled women of Krakow: Jewish, Catholic, and otherwise.
  12. desecrate
    violate the sacred character of a place or language
    People hadn’t come just to loot. They’d come to desecrate.
  13. excavate
    recover through digging
    She opened the shed where we kept the coal and dug around, dirtying her hands, until she excavated a garment bag, then another, then another.
  14. chemotherapy
    the use of drugs to treat disease, especially cancer
    “Your mom has cancer? Is she in the hospital?”
    “She was in the hospital for her lumpectomy but only for the day, and she goes once a week to an infusion center for chemotherapy, but it’s not a hospital, more like a regular doctor’s office. And after that she’ll go somewhere else every day for radiation.”
  15. trauma
    an emotional wound or shock having long-lasting effects
    “My therapist says it’s a normal reaction to trauma....”
Created on Wed Aug 20 19:48:47 EDT 2025 (updated Fri Sep 19 12:00:11 EDT 2025)

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