What is Jane Yolen's viewpoint and purpose for writing the devils arithmetic?

First published in 1988, The Devil's Arithmetic is a historical fiction novel by Jane Yolen. The story revolves aroundHannah Stern, a Jewish girl living in New Rochelle, New York. Tired of hearing her older relatives talk about the past, throughout the novel Hannah is taught about the importance of remembering the history of where one comes from. During a Passover Seder Hannah is transported to Poland in the year 1942. There, she is sent to a Nazi concentration camp after symbolically opening the door for the prophet Elijah. I don't have a lot of knowledge about the author's motives for writing the book. Her target audience would have been young adult fiction. I would suspect that Yolen wanted to introduce a historical narrative that teens could relate to.