A poignant, dignified tribute to Ury who, as a Jew during World War II, was murdered by her countrymen for whom she had...
A uniquely sentimental look at World War I through the eyes of a preteen German girl.
Though still immensely popular in Germany, Ury’s ten Nesthäkchen books are virtually unknown in the United States, an omission Lehrer looks to correct with this fine translation, complete with notes and a brief but highly informative introduction. The book is an engaging tale of two years in the life of Annemarie Braun, a Berlin doctor’s daughter most often referred to by the narrator as "Nesthäkchen,” a wonderfully appropriate sobriquet reserved for spoiled children. Separated from her parents by the war, Annemarie nonetheless lives a comfortable life with her grandmother, siblings, girlfriends and even a cook. The narrative traces her often wildly extravagant, juvenile reactions to the vicissitudes of war. Mercurial by nature, youthfully innocent and self-absorbed due to her social standing, Annemarie filters her experiences of war through her personality in ways that can rarely be deeply felt by the reader, who watches as she flits from one emotion to another, despondent on one page, exultant on the next. Her most sustained behavior proves to be the cruelty she evinces toward a new girl at her school, a long campaign of ill-treatment for which she must eventually seek redemption. Her story is ultimately one of growth through sacrifice, and, not surprisingly, Annemarie matures into a generous, likable young woman by the novel’s end and receives abundant karmic reward for her goodness. Lehrer’s infrequent annotations are precise and cogent, though concerned primarily with military matters sometimes to the exclusion of cultural subjects. With its stilted diction and narrative air of bemused didacticism resembling perhaps nothing more in the American canon than the Horatio Alger books, Nesthäkchen and the World War is no longer likely to appeal to the juvenile audience for which it was originally penned, but Nesthäkchen could, and probably deserves to, find her place in the classroom alongside Ragged Dick as an important glimpse into the spirit of a long-gone age.
A poignant, dignified tribute to Ury who, as a Jew during World War II, was murdered by her countrymen for whom she had written with so much loyalty and love.Pub Date: May 22, 2006
ISBN: 978-0-595-39729-7
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The format of this taut and moving drama forcefully regulates the pacing; breathless, edge-of-the-seat courtroom scenes...
In a riveting novel from Myers (At Her Majesty’s Request, 1999, etc.), a teenager who dreams of being a filmmaker writes the story of his trial for felony murder in the form of a movie script, with journal entries after each day’s action.
Steve is accused of being an accomplice in the robbery and murder of a drug store owner. As he goes through his trial, returning each night to a prison where most nights he can hear other inmates being beaten and raped, he reviews the events leading to this point in his life. Although Steve is eventually acquitted, Myers leaves it up to readers to decide for themselves on his protagonist’s guilt or innocence.
The format of this taut and moving drama forcefully regulates the pacing; breathless, edge-of-the-seat courtroom scenes written entirely in dialogue alternate with thoughtful, introspective journal entries that offer a sense of Steve’s terror and confusion, and that deftly demonstrate Myers’s point: the road from innocence to trouble is comprised of small, almost invisible steps, each involving an experience in which a “positive moral decision” was not made. (Fiction. 12-14)Pub Date: May 31, 1999
ISBN: 0-06-028077-8
Page Count: 280
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1999
PERSPECTIVES
Paulsen recalls personal experiences that he incorporated into Hatchet (1987) and its three sequels, from savage attacks by moose and mosquitoes to watching helplessly as a heart-attack victim dies. As usual, his real adventures are every bit as vivid and hair-raising as those in his fiction, and he relates them with relish—discoursing on “The Fine Art of Wilderness Nutrition,” for instance: “Something that you would never consider eating, something completely repulsive and ugly and disgusting, something so gross it would make you vomit just looking at it, becomes absolutely delicious if you’re starving.” Specific examples follow, to prove that he knows whereof he writes. The author adds incidents from his Iditarod races, describes how he made, then learned to hunt with, bow and arrow, then closes with methods of cooking outdoors sans pots or pans. It’s a patchwork, but an entertaining one, and as likely to win him new fans as to answer questions from his old ones. (Autobiography. 10-13)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-385-32650-5
Page Count: 150
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2000
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