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Risking Exposure

Name: Risking Exposure
Author: Jeanne Moran
ISBN: 978-1-4921-7982-5

by Jeanne Moran ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 28, 2013

While well suited for a YA audience, this eye-catching snapshot of a Hitler Youth lacks strong dialogue.

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A teenage photographer finds her courage amid the turmoil of Nazi Germany in this debut historical novel.

Sophie Adler is a typical German girl growing up in 1938. She enjoys participating in Hitler Youth activities and dreams of becoming a professional photographer. But her entire world changes when she contracts polio and ends up permanently disabled. Suddenly she finds herself cut off from her friends and labeled “useless” by the rest of society. To make matters worse, her parents get into trouble for resisting the Nazi government. Sophie is torn between her desire to fit in and be accepted by her friends again, and her longing to be brave like her parents. Either way, her camera becomes her greatest asset. Her troop’s “Scharführer,” Werner, wants to use her photographs to create pro-Nazi propaganda. But her father tells her to “photograph the truth,” and shows her how to use the camera to fight back. Through it all, she learns to live with her disability and still struggles to maintain her friendship with Werner’s sister, Rennie, and deal with her crush on her classmate Erich. Even though the story takes place in a fairly well-researched historical setting, much of it will resonate with modern teens, as many of Sophie’s problems—peer pressure, relationship struggles, and uncertainty about the future—are universal. But the Nazi setting means all those problems have much higher stakes than they would for a teen in, say, modern America. Unfortunately, the tale’s dialogue sometimes fails to sparkle. Sophie and, occasionally, other characters often have long, expository monologues that sound like they belong in a textbook rather than a novel. Sophie’s conversation with Rennie about a former Jewish friend, in particular, would have been better as a narrative flashback than a monologue. Assuming the author doesn’t have a sequel planned, the ending also leaves quite a few questions unanswered.

While well suited for a YA audience, this eye-catching snapshot of a Hitler Youth lacks strong dialogue.

Pub Date: Sept. 28, 2013

ISBN: 978-1-4921-7982-5

Page Count: 184

Publisher: CreateSpace

Review Posted Online: June 3, 2016

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

TEENS & YOUNG ADULT HISTORICAL FICTION

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LYDDIE

by Katherine Paterson ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 1991

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Abandoned by their mother, whose mental stability has been crumbling since her husband went west, Lyddie and her brother Charlie manage alone through a Vermont winter. But in the spring of 1844, without consulting them, the mother apprentices Charlie to a miller and hires Lyddie out to a tavern, where she is little better than a slave. Still, Lyddie is strong and indomitable, and the cook is friendly even if the mistress is cold and stern; Lyddie manages well enough until a run-in with the mistress sends her south to work in the mills of Lowell, Massachusetts, thus earning a better wage (in a vain hope of saving the family farm), making friends among the other girls enduring the long hours and dangerous conditions, and expanding her understanding of loyalty, generosity, and injustice (she already knows more than most people ever learn about perseverance). Knowing only her own troubled family, Lyddie is unusually reserved, even for a New Englander, With her usual discernment and consummate skill, Paterson depicts her gradually turning toward the warmth of others' kindnesses—Betsy reads Oliver Twist aloud and suggests the ultimate goal of Oberlin College; Diana teaches Lyddie to cope in the mill, setting an example that Lyddie later follows with an Irish girl who is even more naive than she had been; Quaker neighbors offer help and solace that Lyddie at first rejects out of hand. Deftly plotted and rich in incident, a well-researched picture of the period—and a memorable portrait of an untutored but intelligent young woman making her way against fierce odds.

Pub Date: March 1, 1991

ISBN: 0-525-67338-5

Page Count: 192

Publisher: Dutton

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2000

Categories:

TEENS & YOUNG ADULT HISTORICAL FICTION | TEENS & YOUNG ADULT SOCIAL THEMES

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GOING SOLO

by Roald Dahl illustrated by Quentin Blake ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 1, 1986

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A delightfully captivating swatch of autobiography from the author of Kiss. Kiss, Switch Bitch and many others. Schoolboy Dahl wanted adventure. Classes bored him, there was work to be had in Africa, and war clouds loomed on the world's horizons. He finds himself with a trainee's job with Shell Oil of East Africa and winds up in what is now Tanzania. Then war comes in 1939 and Dahl's adventures truly begin. At the war's outbreak, Dahl volunteers for the RAF, signing on to be a fighter pilot. Wounded in the Libyan desert, he spends six months recuperating in a military hospital, then rejoins his unit in Greece, only to be driven back by the advancing Germans. On April 20, 1941, he goes head on against the Luftwaffe in the Battle of Athens. On-target bio installment with, one hopes, lots more of this engrossing life to come.