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ENEMIES IN THE ORCHARD

Name: ENEMIES IN THE ORCHARD
Author: Dana VanderLugt
ISBN: 9780310155775

A WORLD WAR 2 NOVEL IN VERSE

by Dana VanderLugt ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 12, 2023

An emotionally layered vision of a difficult moment in history.

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In a Michigan apple orchard in 1944, a German soldier and an American girl reflect on wartime life.

Claire DeBoer, a careworn 13-year-old Dutch American girl, bears countless responsibilities on her family’s farm and dreams of one day becoming a nurse. Karl Hartmann, a teenage German prisoner of war, arrives in Michigan to do agricultural work through a federal program. The book opens with atmospheric poems introducing each protagonist, effectively using George Ella Lyon’s “Where I’m From” format. This reflective verse novel alternates their perspectives as it explores their intersecting lives. Claire’s brother is fighting in Europe, so the dissonance of enemy soldiers on her farm feels like a cruel joke. Karl is awakening to the immensity of Nazi atrocities and anti-American propaganda, though some of his more nationalistic fellow prisoners are determined to make him suffer. Calm and dread intertwine: The soothing harvest-time rhythms intermingle with the ever-present threat of tremendous loss. Karl and Claire, having lost their youths to a global conflict, discover a tenuous friendship; the hinted-at mutual romantic feelings between an eighth grader and someone described as “almost a man” might cause some discomfort. VanderLugt’s reflections on war’s personal toll and the tensions of having enemy troops working in America offer opportunities for readers to consider matters from many angles. An author’s note describes her inspiration—the German POWs who worked in her own grandfather’s fruit orchards during the war.

An emotionally layered vision of a difficult moment in history. (sources) (Verse historical fiction. 10-14)

Pub Date: Sept. 12, 2023

ISBN: 9780310155775

Page Count: 288

Publisher: Zonderkidz

Review Posted Online: July 26, 2023

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2023

Categories:

CHILDREN'S HISTORICAL FICTION | CHILDREN'S POETRY

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ON THE HORIZON

by Lois Lowry ; illustrated by Kenard Pak ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 7, 2020

A beautiful, powerful reflection on a tragic history.

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In spare verse, Lowry reflects on moments in her childhood, including the bombings of Pearl Harbor and Hiroshima.

When she was a child, Lowry played at Waikiki Beach with her grandmother while her father filmed. In the old home movie, the USS Arizona appears through the mist on the horizon. Looking back at her childhood in Hawaii and then Japan, Lowry reflects on the bombings that began and ended a war and how they affected and connected everyone involved. In Part 1, she shares the lives and actions of sailors at Pearl Harbor. Part 2 is stories of civilians in Hiroshima affected by the bombing. Part 3 presents her own experience as an American in Japan shortly after the war ended. The poems bring the haunting human scale of war to the forefront, like the Christmas cards a sailor sent days before he died or the 4-year-old who was buried with his red tricycle after Hiroshima. All the personal stories—of sailors, civilians, and Lowry herself—are grounding. There is heartbreak and hope, reminding readers to reflect on the past to create a more peaceful future. Lowry uses a variety of poetry styles, identifying some, such as triolet and haiku. Pak’s graphite illustrations are like still shots of history, adding to the emotion and somber feeling. He includes some sailors of color among the mostly white U.S. forces; Lowry is white.

A beautiful, powerful reflection on a tragic history. (author’s note, bibliography) (Memoir/poetry. 10-14)