Brasheres, Ann and Brasheres, Ben. Westfallen
September 17, 2024 by Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
E ARC provided by Edelweiss Plus
Henry, Frances, and Lukas used to be good friends, but when the children developed different interest in middle school, they saw less and less of each other. When their gerbil dies, Henry contacts the other two for a funeral. While digging, they unearth an old radio, and manage to get it to work. They talk to three children their age, Alice, Lawrence, and Artie, who are also from their New Jersey town. They arrange to meet, and both groups are disappointed. When they talk again, landmarks come up. Alice is confused about a war memorial being at the specified location, and Henry is confused about Snyder's Sweet Shop. Why? Henry is in 2023, and Alice and her friends are in 1944. The groups try several experiments to connect across time, and are both clearly tied to the same house address and a shed on the property. When Henry finds out that Snyder's burned down because of a faulty hot plate, Alice and her friends make sure to get the owner to unplug it. The next day at school, one of Henry's classmates, Ada, is not there, and her father's magic shop isn't either, although the Snyder's building is. Upon researching, they realize that Snyder's became a convenience store, and Ada's father was killed working there in 1987. Alice and her friends manage to get the store to burn down a few days later, but things go badly, badly wrong. Unfortunately, both sets of kids destroy the radio, so that they can't contact each other and start other "butterfly effects". It's too late, however. Instead of being in the USA, the children in 2023 are now in Westfallen, which is run by German Nazis. While Frances is Aryan and therefore doing well, Henry is part Black, so assigned to work details in a hospital instead of going to school. Lukas, who is Jewish, is assigned to hard field labor. Realizing that they have to find a way to return the world to a course where the US is victorious, the children discover that a telegram was sent from their town that caused D Day to be a German victory. They manage to communicate across time, and the shed helps Henry and Frances remember the ways things were before. Lukas, however, has his actions circumscribed by his discriminated against status. Will Henry be able to find the woman who sent the telegram and stop it from alerting the Nazis?
September 17, 2024 by Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
E ARC provided by Edelweiss Plus
Henry, Frances, and Lukas used to be good friends, but when the children developed different interest in middle school, they saw less and less of each other. When their gerbil dies, Henry contacts the other two for a funeral. While digging, they unearth an old radio, and manage to get it to work. They talk to three children their age, Alice, Lawrence, and Artie, who are also from their New Jersey town. They arrange to meet, and both groups are disappointed. When they talk again, landmarks come up. Alice is confused about a war memorial being at the specified location, and Henry is confused about Snyder's Sweet Shop. Why? Henry is in 2023, and Alice and her friends are in 1944. The groups try several experiments to connect across time, and are both clearly tied to the same house address and a shed on the property. When Henry finds out that Snyder's burned down because of a faulty hot plate, Alice and her friends make sure to get the owner to unplug it. The next day at school, one of Henry's classmates, Ada, is not there, and her father's magic shop isn't either, although the Snyder's building is. Upon researching, they realize that Snyder's became a convenience store, and Ada's father was killed working there in 1987. Alice and her friends manage to get the store to burn down a few days later, but things go badly, badly wrong. Unfortunately, both sets of kids destroy the radio, so that they can't contact each other and start other "butterfly effects". It's too late, however. Instead of being in the USA, the children in 2023 are now in Westfallen, which is run by German Nazis. While Frances is Aryan and therefore doing well, Henry is part Black, so assigned to work details in a hospital instead of going to school. Lukas, who is Jewish, is assigned to hard field labor. Realizing that they have to find a way to return the world to a course where the US is victorious, the children discover that a telegram was sent from their town that caused D Day to be a German victory. They manage to communicate across time, and the shed helps Henry and Frances remember the ways things were before. Lukas, however, has his actions circumscribed by his discriminated against status. Will Henry be able to find the woman who sent the telegram and stop it from alerting the Nazis?
Strengths: Almost as good as time travel? Communicating across time. Who wouldn't want to stop a soda fountain store from burning down? Some nice wordplay on Westphalia in the title, and the story has just enough detail without getting bogged down in politics. Henry's desire to get his friends back together for some interesting adventures gives us a good excuse to get the radio up and running, and I appreciated that both groups were perfectly willing to accept this odd occurrence. There are enough period details about the 1940s to differentiate the two groups. The alternate US is horrible enough to motivate both groups to try to keep in contact and save the world. Very intriguing story.
Weaknesses: We don't get too many details about what happened to Alice's mom, and I could have used a little more explanation of how Henry and Alice are related. Also, there is a short scene in 1944 with folding a fitted sheet. Fitted sheets would not have been widely adopted until the 1950s. I'm a stickler for details like that, and there was no good reason to have specifically fitted sheets.
What I really think: This has some similarities to Scarrow's Time Riders (2011), with the Germans winning World War II, but that is as old as my students by this point! Also, this gets a lot of bonus points for the radio that connects the two time periods. I can't think I've ever seen anything like that! The Voyagers! feel to this definitely appealed to me! The ending of this had Ada pulling up in a van and telling the kids to get in, so I wonder if there will be a sequel.
Weaknesses: We don't get too many details about what happened to Alice's mom, and I could have used a little more explanation of how Henry and Alice are related. Also, there is a short scene in 1944 with folding a fitted sheet. Fitted sheets would not have been widely adopted until the 1950s. I'm a stickler for details like that, and there was no good reason to have specifically fitted sheets.
What I really think: This has some similarities to Scarrow's Time Riders (2011), with the Germans winning World War II, but that is as old as my students by this point! Also, this gets a lot of bonus points for the radio that connects the two time periods. I can't think I've ever seen anything like that! The Voyagers! feel to this definitely appealed to me! The ending of this had Ada pulling up in a van and telling the kids to get in, so I wonder if there will be a sequel.
A very interesting premise for a time travel book. thanks for the recommendation.
ReplyDelete