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WHEN THE SOLDIERS WERE GONE

Name: WHEN THE SOLDIERS WERE GONE
Author: Vera W. Propp
ISBN: 0-399-23325-3

by Vera W. Propp ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 1, 1999

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Young Henk is shocked to learn that the two strangers at the door are his real parents, come to reclaim him from the Dutch farming couple who had protected him for three years from the Nazis. This fictionalized account of an actual “hidden child’s” post-WWII experience is written in spare, ingenuous style, effectively capturing an eight-year-old’s view of a reasonably familiar, comfortable world suddenly turned upside down. His initial upset calmed by the patient, loving adults around him, he gradually adapts to living in a war-damaged town, to answering to his real name, “Benjamin,” and to a new baby brother (actually an orphaned cousin) as his buried memories slowly begin to resurface. Propp’s protagonist never develops a distinct personality, but his experiences at home, at school, and at play focus not so much on wider historical issues as on what would be important to a child: food, friends, a sense of belonging. Readers whose interest in hidden children has been sparked by such nonfiction works as Maxine B. Rosenberg’s Hiding To Survive (1994) will find this an edifying look at the difficulties younger survivors faced in making the transition to peacetime. (Fiction. 10-12)

Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1999

ISBN: 0-399-23325-3

Page Count: 101

Publisher: Putnam

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 1998

Categories:

CHILDREN'S HISTORICAL FICTION

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THE CONSPIRACY

From the Plot to Kill Hitler series , Vol. 1

by Andy Marino ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 21, 2020

It’s great to see these kids “so enthusiastic about committing high treason.” (historical note) (Historical fiction. 10-12)

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Near the end of World War II, two kids join their parents in a plot to kill Adolf Hitler.

Max, 12, lives with his parents and his older sister in a Berlin that’s under constant air bombardment. During one such raid, a mortally wounded man stumbles into the white German family’s home and gasps out his last wish: “The Führer must die.” With this nighttime visitation, Max and Gerta discover their parents have been part of a resistance cell, and the siblings want in. They meet a colorful band of upper-class types who seem almost too whimsical to be serious. Despite her charming levity, Prussian aristocrat and cell leader Frau Becker is grimly aware of the stakes. She enlists Max and Gerta as couriers who sneak forged identification papers to Jews in hiding. Max and Gerta are merely (and realistically) cogs in the adults’ plans, but there’s plenty of room for their own heroism. They escape capture, rescue each other when they’re caught out during an air raid, and willingly put themselves repeatedly at risk to catch a spy. The fictional plotters—based on a mix of several real anti-Hitler resistance cells—are portrayed with a genuine humor, giving them the space to feel alive even in such a slim volume.

It’s great to see these kids “so enthusiastic about committing high treason.” (historical note) (Historical fiction. 10-12)

Pub Date: April 21, 2020

ISBN: 978-1-338-35902-2

Page Count: 192

Publisher: Scholastic

Review Posted Online: Jan. 20, 2020

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2020

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ACTION & ADVENTURE FICTION | CHILDREN'S HISTORICAL FICTION

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by Andy Marino

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MIDNIGHT WITHOUT A MOON

by Linda Williams Jackson ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 3, 2017

The bird’s-eye view into this pivotal moment provides a powerful story, one that adults will applaud—but between the...

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The ugly brutality of the Jim Crow South is recounted in dulcet, poetic tones, creating a harsh and fascinating blend.

Fact and fiction pair in the story of Rose Lee Carter, 13, as she copes with life in a racially divided world. It splits wide open when a 14-year-old boy from Chicago named Emmett Till goes missing. Jackson superbly blends the history into her narrative. The suffocating heat, oppression, and despair African-Americans experienced in 1955 Mississippi resonate. And the author effectively creates a protagonist with plenty of suffering all her own. Practically abandoned by her mother, Rose Lee is reviled in her own home for the darkness of her brown skin. The author ably captures the fear and dread of each day and excels when she shows the peril of blacks trying to assert their right to vote in the South, likely a foreign concept to today’s kids. Where the book fails, however, is in its overuse of descriptors and dialect and the near-sociopathic zeal of Rose Lee's grandmother Ma Pearl and her lighter-skinned cousin Queen. Ma Pearl is an emotionally remote tyrant who seems to derive glee from crushing Rose Lee's spirits. And Queen is so glib and self-centered she's almost a cartoon.

The bird’s-eye view into this pivotal moment provides a powerful story, one that adults will applaud—but between the avalanche of old-South homilies and Rose Lee’s relentlessly hopeless struggle, it may be a hard sell for younger readers. (Historical fiction. 10-12)