‘Wings Over Valletta’ by Tracy Cook
In my four visits to Malta, my husband’s homeland, I have not yet made it to the Lascaris War Rooms. After reading this historical novel set during the appalling bombardment of the Maltese islands during WWII, I will make sure to visit this site of global significance next time.
Why global significance? Because tiny Malta is located in a spot in the Mediterranean Sea of such strategic importance that whoever controlled it, had a huge advantage during wartime. As a result, the people of Malta endured raids by both Italian and German planes, the islands becoming the most bombed places in the whole war.
Under British control, the authorities set up a command centre deep beneath the capital Valletta, utilising tunnels dug centuries earlier by the order of Knights who then ruled the islands. This is where novelist Tracy Cook set much of the action in her story. She chose to tell of the heroic efforts of the ‘plotters’, Maltese and English women who took on the vital work of plotting air battles and missions.
We have probably all seen footage of plotters in Britain, who showed the movements of enemy and Allied planes by pushing markers around huge maps, allowing those responsible for battle strategy to get a visual representation of what was happening. This was well before the age of digital screens and instant information transmission as we have today. In Malta, the women who did this work were not employed by the RAF. Rather, they were civilian women recruited from towns and villages across the islands.
The Ops Room, Ladscaris War Rooms. Source: ‘Historia Magazine’ https://historiamag.com/women-siege-malta/ They worked long hours in difficult physical conditions under immense pressure. At the end of a wearying shift, they faced even more stressful conditions when back above ground: the destruction of their homes, local services, constant air raid sirens requiring a fast exit to the nearest shelter. They worried about their families, friends, neighbours…Sworn to secrecy about their work, they were unable to share their worries with anyone outside.
Wings Over Valletta portrays all this through the eyes of the protagonist Kitty Campbell, whose father is a senior figure in the British Navy in Malta. Kitty is at home in Malta, with local friends and a job, until the war interrupts her normal life. It is then she signs up for work as a plotter and descends into the War Room tunnels for her first shift.
The enormous challenges faced by the Maltese people are skillfully portrayed: loss and heartache; hunger as the seige bit hard; anxiety over a possible German invasion. The internal political divisions are also shown: Malta had been a British colony for over 150 years and even in wartime, there were people agitating for independence, which was eventually achieved in 1964. Yet the country as a whole was awarded the George Cross for their bravery in 1942: the only nation to have ever been so collectively honoured.
Kitty nurses her own private loss and heartache: a child she unwillingly gave up for adoption years before, and her determination to find this little girl. She also faces betrayal from people she trusts and the hurt of knowing she’d been lied to. Like all the women plotters in the War Rooms, she has to find a way to navigate her own problems while staying focused and strong in her mission to help the war effort.
When she meets a British flying officer, romance blossoms, which adds to the story but doesn’t detract from the themes of danger, worry and commitment to duty .
This book is an emotional testament and tribute to the courage and tenacity of the people of Malta. It’s also chock full of references to Maltese lifestyle, food, culture and language, resulting in a wonderful portrayal of a tiny country which played a very big role on the world stage.
If you’d like to find out more about this amazing chapter of WWII history, you can read more about the Lascaris War Rooms here.
Wings Over Valletta was published by Allison & Busby Publishers in 2026.
My thanks to the publishers and to NetGalley for a review copy.The tragedy of war: ‘When Sleeping Women Wake’ by Emma Pei Yin
‘When sleeping women wake, mountains move.‘
This is the kind of historical fiction that has me turning immediately to the Author’s Note, and then searching for more information on the events and places depicted, as I read.
I knew next to nothing about the fate of Hong Kong Chinese under the brutal occupation by the Japanese Imperial Army in WWII, and this novel (the first by Australian-Hong Kong Chinese author Emma Pei Yin) certainly whet my appetitie to learn more.
It follows three women through the war; their stories and eventual fates connected but separated for a time after the invasion of their home.
Mingzhu is married to a wealthy businessman, leading a luxurious but unsatisfying life. As First Wife, she adores her daughter Qiang but must endure the taunts of her husband’s concubine with whom he has a son. Mingzhu is intelligent and strong-willed and to ensure her daughter has opportunities that were denied to her, she chooses a compassionate and well educated English man to tutor Qiang as the girl grows into young adulthood.
Biyu is her companion and maid, who came into Mingzhu’s family when Mingzhu herself was born. Loving and loyal, Biyu has devoted her life to her mistress and will do anything to protect her and young Qiang.
Qiang dreams of more: an education, a profession…and when the war hits, she dreams of fighting to protect her home and family.
But when the Japanese Army descends on Hong Kong, the three women are separated. Each endure hardship and witness unspeakable acts of cruelty, alongside courage and kindness, sometimes from unexpected sources.
The story traces the development of the East River Column, a group of resistance fighters. This part of the novel is based on a real group whose acts of sabotage, theft of weapons, rescue of downed Allied pilots and victims of the Japanese Army, all played a part to hinder the invaders in their goal of complete domination of Asia. It’s a thrilling story, underlaid with the real human tragedy of war, represented by Mingzhu, Biyu and Qiang and those they encounter.
These three women also represent some of the best attributes of the human instinct for survival, loyalty, love and courage. While the novel doesn’t have a stereotypical ‘happy ending’, it does offer hope and a profound respect for those caught up in suffering at the hands of others.
When Sleeping Women Wake was published in 2025 by Hachette Australia.
‘The Serpent Bearer’ by Jane Rosenthal
What do a Jewish veteran of the Spanish Civil War, a glamorous British aristocrat, and a beautiful Hollywood screenwriter, have in common – and how do they all end up in Mexico in 1941, at the height of World War II?
That’s the riddle at the heart of this intruiging novel by US writer Jane Rosenthal, who deftly weaves her Jewish and southern heritage, along with research trips , into the book’s settings (South Carolina and the Yucatan region) to bring to life the humidity, mosquitos and lushness of the region, with the menace of the time and place.
Solly is a reluctant recruit to a newly formed US spy agency; he is tasked with infiltrating a group of Nazi collaborators and spies operating in the Yucatan. He discovers that there are plans afoot for a German invasion of the US, so the stakes are high.
He also discovers a motley group of refugees from Nazi atrocities in Europe who look to him for salvation. And, raising the stakes further, he learns that somewhere nearby in the Yucatan is Estelle, the British women whom he loved, then lost in Spain – and vowed to find again at whatever the cost.
But before he can get out of Mexico, there are many more discoveries awaiting Solly, both personal and political – all of them dangerous. How he steers his way through them makes for a page-turning, and at times quite moving, novel.
While Solly is the main protagonist, there are a cast of characters who ably support and enrich the narrative: particularly Estelle, Grace (the Hollywood writer who has, like Solly, been sent on a spy mission to Mexico) and Sister Immaculata, a nun who plays a vital role in the novel’s climactic scenes. These are women of agency and drive, with their own particular agendas, and important to the emotional and narrative arc of the story.
The descriptive passages are brilliant: I almost felt immobilised by the humidity myself even though I was reading in a much more comfortable environment!
The title refers to the ancient Greek myth of Ophichus, and the constellation of that name, depicting a man holding a snake, long associated with healing, transformation, and a bridge between death and life:
“It’s up there somewhere.” Grace had interrupted his thoughts. “The constellation of the Serpent Bearer, the god that brings the dead back to life. I wish we could do that, don’t you?’…
“All we can do is what we’ve done, Grace,” he whispered. “Bring souls back from the brink like those refugees …”
The Serpent Bearer loc.99%The Serpent Bearer is published by She Writes Press and distributed by Simon & Schuster in April 2025
My thanks to the publishers and to NetGalley for an advanced reading copy to review.
Monsters and angels: ‘All the Beautiful Things’ by Katrina Nannestad
Australian children’s author Katrina Nannestad has a gift: to convey real (and often distressing) past events to younger readers, in a way that illuminates rather than overwhelms.
As with her earlier middle-grade books set in WWII Europe, the focus is again on the experiences of children (here are my reviews for We Are Wolves, Rabbit, Soldier, Angel, Thief and Waiting for the Storks ).
All the Beautiful Things takes us to the heart of Nazi Germany, a village nestled under the mountain where Hitler’s Bavarian home, the Berghof, stands.
Anna and her friend Udo are eleven, coping with the restrictions and hardships of wartime life as best they can. Like all German children they are members of the Nazi organisations for youngsters, are taught to love and obey the Fuhrer, and give the Nazi salute when required.
They both have a secret: they and their families hate Hitler. And upstairs in the apartment where Anna lives with her mother, is another secret: little Eva, Anna’s sister, hidden away from the world because if she were discovered, her differences would likely mean her death.
This is the core historical fact of this story: the shocking program of involuntary euthenasia carried out by Nazi doctors on Hitler’s orders, in their distorted efforts to eliminate any ‘weaknesses’ from the pure Aryan race.
As the war drags on, Anna and Udo learn that there is a network of other people in their community who feel the way they do about the Nazis – sometimes the most surprising people. They also learn that people are not always simply ‘monsters’ or ‘angels’: that they can be both and it can be hard to tell one from the other.
‘So how do we tell the monsters and the angels apart?’ I ask.
‘Well, there’s the problem, Anna,’ says Dr Fischer. ‘It can be tricky because the two can look so very similar. But one day, I assure you, it will be plain for all to see. A monster’s deeds, no matter how prettily they’re packaged, will ultimately lead to death and destrucion – for everything and everyone they touch.’All the Beautiful Things p152
In the first chapter, readers are plunged into Anna’s world, trying to understand the different views and experiences of Germans during this terrible time. They see how brainwashing occurs, through programs such as Hitler Youth and in schools. Moral choices abound: is the safety of my family more important than yours? Is it wrong to disobey laws if they are bad laws that hurt others? They also witness Anna’s confusion as Germany’s defeat looks more and more likely. She longs for the end of Nazi rule but that means that she must also want the defeat of her own country.
Underlying all are the themes of love, of family and friendship, kindness and compassion. There is also the best description of the value of difference I have ever read, using the metaphor of a jigsaw puzzle:
‘The world is a jigsaw puzzle, every person a unique piece. There is a space for each one, but it must be a space made just for them. And if we leave one piece out, no matter how small, plain, insignificant or odd it may seem, the jigsaw puzzle remains incomplete. The picture looks ugly because there’s a gap.’
All the Beautiful Things p32
Martina Heiduczek’s lovely illustrations once again add another dimension to the unfolding story.
All the Beautiful Things is published by HarperCollins Children’s Books in October 2024.
My thanks to the publishers for a review copy.Austria in WWII: ‘The Secret Society of Salzburg’ by Renee Ryan
This historical fiction book opens with the arrest by the Gestapo of acclaimed and loved Austrian opera singer Elsa Mayer-Braun, on a stage in Salzburg in 1943. So, an early heads up of what one of the two main characters has to deal with.
From here the narrative weaves back and forth in time, and also across the English Channel, from the Continent to London, where we meet the other protagonist Hattie, who works in a dull civil service office, but longs to paint.
An unlikely pair of women to put together, but that is what the author does, as a chance meeting develops into a deep friendship between the two. Hattie travels to Austria with her sister to see Elsa perform and the sisters become stalwart fans of Elsa and her operas.
But of course war is coming and once their nations are at war, everything changes – except the women’s determination to carry out the secretive work of smuggling Jews out of Austria to England. Both Elsa and Hattie will not stop these life-saving rescue missions, despite the ever-increasing danger involved.
While Hattie’s artistic career takes off and Elsa travels Europe to perform – including singing for some high ranking Nazi officers – their secret missions ramp up.
As the tension mounts the reader is left guessing: is Elsa’s husband a threat or an ally? Who is the art dealer who supports Hattie’s artistic success and may just be falling in love with her? Will Elsa’s deep secrets be kept hidden or discovered by the Nazi heirarchy?
I loved that this story was inspired by real-life English sisters, civil servants who learned of the persecution of Jews through a freindship with an Austrian conductor and his wife. In my view, the best kind of historical fiction is that which touches on real people or events.
The Secret Society of Salzburg gives an insight into the experiences of Austrians in the lead-up and the early years of the war and Nazi occupation. It’s an engrossing story, well told.
The Secret Society of Salzburg was published in November 2023 by HarperCollins. My thanks to the publishers for a review copy.
Legacy of war: ‘Hungry Ghosts’ by CJ Barker
English-born Australian writer CJ Barker has created a novel that delivers profound truths about war and about the ways in which trauma’s effects on lives and relationships can endure.
The protagonists are working class Vic and Ruth, whose experiences in WWII inform their relationships and life trajectories for ever.
First we meet Vic’s father Frank, a veteran of the first World War, described as a quiet reserved man who keeps to himself. He deals with the unwelcome memories of his war years by turning to alcohol and work. Young Vic witnesses his father’s drunken episodes and times when ‘volcanos of rage’ rip through the house. Then Frank deserts his family to wander the countryside, a vagabond. He leaves a gift for his son – an old camera rescued from a rubbish heap. That camera is to become a salvation of sorts, but it also adds to Vic’s later grief and despair.
After his mother is killed in a bombing raid, Vic goes to live with his aunt Amelia, an unorthodox, modern woman who introduces him to photography as an art form. When war starts he joins the RAAF and hopes to be a pilot; instead he becomes a bomb aimer: a role that requires him to lie flat in the nose of the plane, directing the pilot to the target, then release the bombs at the right moment. On each mission, the crew expect to die.
Meanwhile, Ruth grows up in a poor neighbourhood in East London. She dreams of getting an education and a proper job that would allow her entry to the bigger world that beckons. But the best her world offers is a shorthand course and a secretarial job.
Then the war begins and she endures the Blitz along with her neighbours, crowded into air raid shelters at night. She volunteers for the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force where her clerical skills are put to use. She has ambitions beyond what’s expected for women at the time – she aims for work interpreting arial photographs taken by Allied reconnaissance planes, roles mainly given to university educated women, as are officer positions.
The inequalities and unfairness of their society are painfully apparent to both Vic and Ruth, even as they serve their country and what they believe is the greater good.
At RAF Medmenham base in Buckinghamshire she and Vic meet. Their attraction to each other outlasts the war and while they must endure their own wartime tragedies separately, they eventually marry on VE Day. Their child, James, is born and Ruth must give up her job and become a full-time wife and mother, something she’d never planned.
It isn’t long before the lasting effects of the war begin to impact on the little family. Vic has found work as a professional photographer and his career is promising. But his inner torment and lingering mental and spiritual injuries find expression in the same way he’d seen with his father – alcoholism. Vic becomes a distant father, often cruel, and little James grows up under the shadow of two generations of war-induced suffering.
So a third generation enters a world dominated by conflict.
James begins study at Cambridge University – an opportunity denied his parents, but he questions its relevance in the face of the protests, drug use, anti-war sentiment and counter-culture of the sixties and early seventies. His father is lost to him – not even widespread praise for Vic’s stark photographs of the conflict in Vietnam can convince James that his father is anything but a useless, cowardly waste of a life.
There is a resolution – imperfect as these often are, but one which allows us to feel more hopeful for James’s future.
The settings and characters of the story are beautifully realised; the details of wartime in Britain conjure the darkness of that time, the reality that whether civilian or military, you could die at any moment. The hope that some held for a better world afterward:
For him, England, or at least East Anglia, had become a giant aircraft carrier littered with runways and rubble. He was familiar with the Nissen huts and landing strips of his base. He was intimate with the night sky over Germany and the tracer bullets that sped towards him like a stream of malicious fireflies. His homeland, though, felt like another country, alien to his memories, like a long-lost relative with whom he hoped to be reunited, only to find that they had grown apart during the missing years. And yet this ashen graveyard – this England – this was the place where he hoped that justice would spout like crocuses in spring.
Hungry Ghosts p99 /30% (ebook)Hungry Ghosts is a beautiful, engrossing novel about all the hurts that humans can inflict on each other; and also about resilience and vulnerability:
Over and over, a question arose in his mind, like a bad dream, or a Zen riddle: after we have seen the horror, how do we go on?
Hungry Ghosts p227/67% (ebook)You can read a guest post by the author on the blog Whispering Stories, in which he discusses the genesis of the book and describes it as a ‘letter of understanding and forgiveness to my (now deceased) parents.’
Hungry Ghosts is published by The Book Guild in March 2024.
My thanks to the author for a review copy.
Unlikely connections: ‘The Star on the Grave’ by Linda Margolin Royal
Did you know that six thousand Jewish refugees were saved from murder at the hands of Nazis during WWII by escaping Europe via Japan? And that they were able to do so by the actions of a brave and committed Japanese diplomat, Chiune Sugihara, who in defiance of his government’s express orders, wrote transit visas for desperate people trying to flee from Lithuania.
He was helped in this by an official from the Netherlands, who supplied documents allowing refugees to travel through the Dutch colony of Curacao, and from there to Japan. From Japan, individuals and families found refuge in countries such as the USA and Australia.
I had never heard of either of these individuals, whose courageous and compassionate actions have been lost in the stories of that terrible war. And the connection between Japan, Poland, Lithuania and Australia seems unlikely, doesn’t it?
The Jews whose lives they saved included the author’s own family: her father and grandparents fled Poland to Lithuania, and were amongst those who owed their lives to Sugihara and the Dutch man Jan Zwartendijk. Rachael wrote this book, her first novel, to tell their story and that of the men who saved them.
In the novel, the main character Rachel is a young nurse who lives with her widowed father and has a close relationship with her Polish grandmother, Felka, whom she adores. It is Sydney in 1968. Rachel has been brought up as a Christian, attended a Catholic school, and is engaged to marry Yanni, a doctor at the hospital where she works.
When she tells Felka that she must convert to Yanni’s religion of Greek Orthodoxy on their marriage, her grandmother’s reaction is bewildering and confusing. Then Felka announces her plan to attend a reunion of friends in Japan, and asks Rachel to accompany her. She is puzzled. What is this ‘reunion’, and why Japan?
When she is told the truth of her family, she is incredulous. Her father and grandparents were among those able to get out of Europe because of Mr Sugihara. And they are Jewish. The trip to Japan is for survivors to meet with Mr Sugihara, to thank him for their lives.
Rachel’s shock and sense of betrayal at having been lied to her entire life are profound. Slowly, she begins to understand the reasons why her father and Felka did what they did: to protect her, so that she would never know the hatred and anti-Semitism that they had experienced.
She travels to Japan with Felka and there, hearing the stories of the other people saved by Sugihara, she grapples with the questions of who she is and what the revelation of being Jewish means: does it bring a heritage of suffering and loss, or of family, tradition and deep connection? Or all of those things?
And how has the trauma experienced by her surviving family members manifested in their personalities, their relationships and approaches to life?
These are all deep, deep questions she must face, and all at once. It is difficult and painful. Through travelling to Japan with Felka, listening to the people she meets there, and reappraising her own beliefs, Rachel finds some acceptance and a strong desire to learn more.
Initially, I thought Rachel’s ignorance of the events of WWII, the Nazi persecutions and concentration camps, the murders and unspeakable cruelties, was somewhat disingenuous. But I reminded myself that Rachel had come to adulthood barely twenty years after the war. She was taught the minimum details of the conflict at school, and not knowing of her personal connection to those events, did not seek to learn more. And many, many survivors, refugees and veterans, were reluctant to talk about their experiences, preferring to try to forget, to move on with life.
The Star on the Grave is a moving story of one family, fictionalised but inspired by her own, in a surprising and little-known chapter of that global conflict. I found it absorbing, and I hope to read future works by Ms Margolin Royal.
The Star on the Grave is published by Affirm Press in January 2024.
My thanks to the publishers and NetGalley for a review copy.
What if? : ‘The Paris Notebook’ by Tessa Harris
Tessa Harris writes fiction featuring stories about women in WWII. The Light We Left Behind tells of women in intelligence roles at Trent Park, where German officers were held as prisoners in England. The Paris Notebook explores a fascinating ‘what if?’ scenario of the late 1930’s: as Europe was poised for war, what could have happened if the deep-rooted psychiatric problems of Adolf Hitler had become public knowledge? Would it have been enough for Germany to avoid the looming disaster of his making?
It’s easy for us today to assume that the serious psychological flaws of someone like Hitler would have been obvious to everyone who mattered. Let’s not forget that within Germany and elsewhere, there were many who agreed with his views on race and how to solve Germany’s economic and social problems. He had admirers in many places.
As an aside, let’s also not overlook the fact that the United States of America has already elected someone like Trump to be its leader, and may even do so again – despite damning information about the man now in the public domain.
So, it obviously takes more than information to change minds. As we see with responses to climate change (or lack of them) despite the plethora of scientific evidence now available.
Having said that, the premise of this novel is an tantalising one. The author’s note explains the real historical facts of the ‘notebook’ of the book’s title, and it’s not hard to see how the publication of a psychiatrist’s clinical notes on Hitler would have been an intelligence bombshell, had it been able to be deployed in time.
And it is this which forms the core of the book. The protagonist is Katya, a young German woman who is employed by a psychiatrist to type out his clinical notes on Hitler, in the hope that they can be published, and so possibly avert Germany pursuing the path to war. Both Katya and Dr Viktor are nursing emotional wounds caused by the Nazis and the stakes are high. They end up traveling to Paris to try to persuade a publisher there to take up the story.
The author paints a vivid picture of how Germans opposed to the Nazis live in fear of discovery and brutal retribution. It’s contrasted with France, where before war is declared, many people seem determined to ignore the threat posed by Nazi Germany and pretend that nothing is amiss.
Events catch up with everyone as all-out war erupts across Europe, and Dr Viktor and Katya are embroiled in a dangerous cat-and-mouse tussle with German agents over possession of the explosive notes.
In Paris, they meet Daniel, a world-weary Irish journalist nursing his own grief, who joins their cause.
The romance in the story did not work for me, and the ending really did not: a little too neat for my taste.
I was willing to overlook both of these issues because I found the rest of the story gripping and I felt invested in the publication of the doctor’s work – even though I already knew the big-picture outcome.
There is a real trend in historical fiction featuring women’s often overlooked roles and experiences in WWII. The Paris Notebook offers another take on the genre, with that intriguing ‘what if?’ question at its centre.
The Paris Notebook is published by HQ Fiction, in July 2023.
My thanks to the publishers for a review copy.
‘The Hidden Book’ by Kirsty Manning
The sixth novel by Australian author Kirsty Manning explores the legacy of WWII trauma and loss over several generations.
It was inspired by the true story of an album of photographs smuggled out of Mauthausen concentration camp in Austria. The graphic and shocking photographs were taken by an inmate of the camp under instructions from the camp commander, who wanted five albums made to present to his superior officers – itself a rather sickening act, I think.
The photographer risked all to create a sixth copy of each photo, which he kept hidden, until they could be smuggled out and kept in safety by a local villager. After the war, the photos were used by prosecutors during the Nuremberg war crimes trials. The album was brought to Australia in the 1970’s and today is kept at the Sydney Jewish Museum.
From these historical events, the author has woven a tale of courage and heartbreak, the pain that memories can inflict and the importance of truth telling. She has imagined how the album got to be in Australia, creating a cast of fictional characters and relationships that are entirely believable and compelling.
Hannah is a teenager in 1980’s rural Australia with her mum, who emigrated from then-Yugoslavia and married an Australian man. Hannah’s father has died and she has a difficult and complicated relationship with her mother, Roza; but she adores her grandfather Nico, who visits every few years.
On his last visit he leaves a mysterious book, wrapped in an ordinary calico bag. Roza refuses to allow Hannah to see it and hides the book, but Hannah later finds it. What she sees are confronting images, bewildering to her young eyes. Over the years, she learns about the war, the Holocaust and the camps, and longs to see the album again, to make better sense of it and to understand the legacy Nico’s experiences have left for her family. She studies history at university and decides to undertake an honours thesis, on aspects of WWII camps related to her grandfather’s experiences:
You couldn’t rewrite history, but you could explore different ways to study it and bring it into the present political and cultural domain…the whole of Mauthausen, inside and outside the camp, needed to be treated with reverence and remembrance. The question of how to present and tell stories of the past could perhaps be one of the backbones of her thesis.
The Hidden Book, ebook location 123 of 221Alternating with Hannah’s contemporary story are those of Nico during his long years at Mauthausen camp; Santiago, a young Spanish boy who helps the photographer Mateo in the darkroom; and Lena, a young woman in the village who is entrusted with the care of the photos. All of these characters risk punishment and likely death if their activities are discovered.
The novel is a tale of incredible courage and endurance, and of completing a journey that began decades earlier for Nico, Roza and Hannah.
It is a moving story about war and its aftermath. Readers who enjoy historical fiction with a foot firmly in real historic events, will love The Hidden Book.
It is published by Allen & Unwin in August 2023.
My thanks to the publishers and NetGalley for a review copy.
Timeslip: ‘Running with Ivan’ by Suzanne Leal
How do you explain to youngsters an event as unimaginable as the Holocaust in a way that elicits empathy and understanding rather than trauma?
Australian author Suzanne Leal has chosen a timeslip novel that allows readers to imagine themselves in the midst of such horror, while relating it to modern-day concerns of children and teens. In the author’s words:
The enormity of the Holocaust makes it almost impossible to comprehend. Mindful of this, I wanted to bring an immediacy to wartime Europe when writing Running with Ivan. That is why Leo – a boy from the twenty-first century with little understanding of the war and its impact – needed to find himself dropped right in the middle of it. Only then could he begin to understand what actually happened.
Author’s Note, Running with Ivan p 308Leo is thirteen, unhappy at having to share a bedroom in his new home with his detestable stepbrother Cooper. He still misses his mum who died two years ago. Now his dad has remarried: to a nice woman with horrible sons. There is nowhere Leo can go to get away from Cooper and his older brother Troy. Until he discovers a corner of the unused garage, and his mother’s old wind-up music box.
The music box proves to be a portal into the past, and Leo is transported to various times and places before, during and after World War II. He meets Ivan, who grows from a small child to a teenager as Leo appears and disappears. Ivan is Czech, and Jewish, and on each of Leo’s visits to his world, things are getting darker and more dangerous for Ivan and his family.
On a later visit, Leo finds himself in Theresienstadt, a walled ghetto used by the Nazis as a concentration camp, from where they transported trainloads of people to Auschwitz. He takes a terrible risk to save his friends, Ivan and Olinda, from being put on a transport.
The motif of running is used throughout the novel, as Leo discovers he has a talent for speed and finds that it soothes and distracts him from his problems at home and his worries about his Czech friends. There is a lovely link between his elderly coach, Mr Livingstone, and Leo’s wartime experiences, which is revealed at the end of the story.
Throughout the novel, Leo learns more about the experiences of people during WWII; the grim realities of life in Europe at that time; and his own struggles with his family. He also learns that he can overcome difficulties:
“Take it from me, Leo, at thirteen, you can do almost anything. Never forget this. Difficult things, courageous things: they are all possible, even at thirteen. No, especially at thirteen.”
Running with Ivan, p39Running with Ivan is a terrific example of how timeslip stories can immerse a reader in the past (or future) while remaining connected to their own present. I was especially moved to read that the idea for the story came from the author’s friendship with a Czech man who had himself experienced the horrors of Theresienstadt.
The book is published by HarperCollins Children’s Books in February 2023.
My thanks to the publishers for a copy to review.
