Rallying together, the people of Camp cut up mattress covers for uniforms, found wood for bleachers, and friends from home sent bats, balls, and gloves. Everyone played baseball. The children as well as the grownups.
Category: Book Reviews
The Silver Sword
When the Nazis came to Poland, they did not close Joseph’s school. Instead, they removed the Polish textbooks and banished the Polish language from the school. They also hung portraits of Hitler in all of the classrooms. When, during a Scripture lesson, Joseph turned Hitler’s picture to the wall, someone reported him. A few nights later, the Nazi stormtroopers came for Joseph and took him to Zakyna. Margrit and the children were left to fend for themselves. After many trials and failed escape attempts, Joseph finally escaped out of the prison camp. It was then that the Nazis came for Margrit.
Books by Horseback: A Librarian’s Brave Journey to Deliver Books to Children
“Edith is a packhorse librarian. Every day she travels for miles to deliver books. William lives far back in the mountains. Edith will have to ride hard to reach his family’s cabin.” There is a storm coming, but that doesn’t stop Edith. Or her horse. And this is what keeps her going. As summarized in…
One Thousand Tracings: Healing the Wounds of World War II
“We have only one pair of boots and must take turns. I work at night, and my husband works during the day. We spend the rest of the time in bed for warmth.”
Andrew Henry’s Meadow
The black and white illustration in this book is enchanting. The details on the dragonfly’s wings and the lovely pictures of nature demonstrate real artistic merit. Each page has a scene which is a story unto itself. The art is perfect.
The Stout-Hearted Seven: Orphaned on the Oregon Trail
Wow! What a story! I would have been impressed if The Stout-Hearted Seven had been fiction. To know that it is non-fiction is exhilarating and tragic all at the same time. Reading true stories like this makes things like Marvel movies seem ridiculous. True courage and fortitude are not found in superheroes with capes but in stout-hearted people with a will to follow God’s leading and their own conviction.
The Trumpeter of Krakow
Written in a style that reminds me of Lloyd Alexander and Tonke Dragt, this novel for young readers is a lovely example of historical fiction. As the quote from Louis Bechtel indicates, it blends true events and real people beautifully with legend and an interesting fictional story. Fifteenth-century Joseph Charnetski is the son of Pan’ Andrew Charnetski, a Polish noble from Kresy (modern-day Ukraine). The Charnetski family is fleeing their home because madman Peter Button-Face has burned their village to the ground under the orders of Ivan III of Russia (Ivan the Terrible). The family hopes to find refuge with their cousin, Andrew Tenczynski in Krakow.
From the Good Mountain: How Gutenberg Changed the World
James Rumford’s story opens with a riddle. Each element of the riddle is explained in imagination-sparking prose with glowing illustrations. The rags became paper stiffened with glue made from bones. The brown coat was leather, printing types were molded from the lead and tin, and the oak was used to build the printing press. The…
Show Notes: To Say Nothing of the Dog
Show notes from our November book club, To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis. Book Club Guests include: Kristi Stansfield, Sherry Early, and Tanya Arnold.
The Christmas Rocket
Dino is almost ten years old. Many years of working in the family pottery shop have shriveled his grandfather like an old pea with a knitted cap upon his bald head, and made his Papa’s back stooped. Tomorrow is Christmas Eve, and Dino must go down to the village with his Papa to sell their…
Our Cat Flossie
This book celebrates the often humorous ways in which cats worm their way into our hearts. Flossie isn’t killing birds and catching fish. Rather, she has a hobby of “bird watching” and “fishing.”
Blizzard at the Zoo
This unassuming picture book by Robert Bahr is excellent. Written in 1982, it has the quality of an older science reader-type book but it captures the more modern event of the 1977 blizzard at the Buffalo Zoo in New York.
Show Notes: Our Reading Life – November
Sarah Kim’s References: Sara Masarik’s References: Tanya’s References: Diane’s References:
To Say Nothing of the Dog
To Say Nothing of the Dog is pure delight. Connie Willis’s writing is elegant and refined. But it is also deeply informed by theatre and movies.
The Thief
The Thief is exciting, creative, and intellectually satisfying. Every time I read it, I cannot help but feel like I am re-entering Lewis’s Till We Have Faces..