Tag Archives: Historical Fiction

MG Review ~ HOW I BECAME A SPY

27 Monday May 2019

Posted by in Book Reviews, Middle Grade, Mystery, Reading

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By Deborah Hopkinson ~ A Mystery of WWII London

How I Became A Spy coverBertie Bradshaw never set out to become a spy. He never imagined traipsing around war-torn London, solving ciphers, practicing surveillance, and searching for a traitor to the Allied forces. He certainly never expected that a strong-willed American girl named Eleanor would play Watson to his Holmes (or Holmes to his Watson, depending on who you ask).

But when a young woman goes missing, leaving behind a coded notebook, Bertie is determined to solve the mystery. With the help of Eleanor and his friend David, a Jewish refugee–and, of course, his trusty pup, Little Roo–Bertie must decipher the notebook in time to stop a double agent from spilling the biggest secret of all to the Nazis.

This suspenseful WWII adventure reminds us that times of war call for bravery, brains and teamwork from even the most unlikely heroes. [Cover Synopsis]

Danger and daring wrapped in a page-turning mystery

I chanced upon this book while browsing in a local indie bookstore. Everything about it intrigued me and I bought it on the spot.

Bertie Bradshaw volunteered as an air-raid messenger to redeem himself for a past mistake and stumbles onto a mystery of national importance. Hopkinson weaves historical facts through a masterfully plotted mystery, bringing the characters, time, and place to life.

Five things that kept me turning the pages:

  • The first lines: “I wasn’t thinking about becoming a spy that night. I was trying to be brave, do a good job, and stay out of trouble. It wasn’t going well.”
  • The dog: Little Roo, the black spaniel, is a service dog who’s skill is finding people trapped in bombed out buildings. However, Roo’s bond with Bertie runs much deeper and plays an important role in solving the mystery.
  • The history: Real-life facts, such as the Special Operations Executive (SOE) Manual quotes, food rationing, air-raid sirens, General Eisenhower and his dog, bring WWII London—and all that happened there—to life.
  • The cryptography: Ciphers used in espionage during WWII are realistically woven throughout the story. We see how they’re used and learn how they work as our characters break them.
  • The friendships: Bertie, Eleanor, and David, a Jewish refugee, form a kindred bond as they struggle to crack the ciphers in the mysterious notebook, in the race to save the nation, and world, in its darkest hour.

Praise for “HOW I BECAME A SPY”

“This middle grade mystery novel starts with a bang and sends readers on a breakneck journey through World War II London.” —School Library Journal

“Hopkinson has written a cleverly plotted, page-turning mystery that vividly evokes wartime Britain… Fans of puzzles, mysteries, and historical fiction will be delighted by Hopkinson’s latest.” —Booklist 

“Red herrings, a poignant Bradshaw family backstory, ciphers to decode, a subplot regarding a young Jewish refugee friend of Bertie’s, cameos by real-life historical figures (General Eisenhower and his dog; cipher expert Leo Marks)—there’s certainly no shortage of entry points for young readers, and never a dull moment.” —The Horn Book

STAY SWEET ~ Rich in character, satisfying in substance

29 Sunday Jul 2018

Posted by in Books, contemporary, Historical Fiction, Young Adult

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Summer, ice cream, and friendship…

It doesn’t get more quintessentially summer than that. Except this sweet read starts there, and then sweeps you off on an unexpectedly delicious ride.

STAY SWEET, by Siobhan Vivian

Stay Sweet, coverMay 3, 1945…

When the young men of Sand Lake went off to war, Molly Meade started making ice cream to cheer up her heart-broken friends.

What began as a feel-good whim turned into an unexpected success. The small town clamored for the flavors Molly created with her own secret recipes and surplus from her family’s dairy.

Molly started a decades-long tradition. Summer in Sand Lake wasn’t complete without a trip to Meade Creamery—the local ice cream stand she founded in 1944.

From its founding, the Meade Creamery stand was managed exclusively by local girls, who inevitably bonded into a sisterhood of best friends. The summers seventeen-year-old Amelia Triple scoop ice cream coneworked at the stand had been life changing. It’s where she met her best friend Cate and learned the essentials of life: who the best teachers were, how to dodge parental restrictions, and how to make the perfect sundae.

When Amelia is finally chosen as “Head Girl” for the summer—an honor she’s secretly dreamed of since her first day as a Meade Creamery Girl—she expects it to be the best summer of her life. That is, until Amelia finds Molly passed away on the floor of the stand the first day she’s in charge.

The stand is doomed to close, until Molly’s grandnephew, Grady, comes to town for the funeral. He’s inherited Molly’s property, including the stand, and is determined to take over where his great-aunt left off. Grady is the first guy ever to work at Meade Creamery, and he threatens to everything, including Amelia’s heart. Grady depends on Amelia to help save the business, and their budding romance ultimately stresses Amelia’s friendship with Cate and the other girls to the breaking point.

Home Sweet Home for the soul

This story had the same effect on me as Meade Creamery’s secret Home Sweet Home ice cream had on its patrons for decades: deliciously satisfying, mysterious, invigorating, and mesmerizing. What started out as a simple summer best-friend story, turned into a page-turning ride I didn’t want to end.

The intertwining threads from Molly Meade’s World War II era diary entries and the present-day experiences of Amelia, Cate, and Grady, offer a rich comparison of social expectations and mores. This, combined with the universal theme of believing in yourself and finding the confidence to pursue your dreams, is a testament to the indomitable spirit of true passion, no matter the times.

4 ice cream cones

Time as a Story Element ~ Setting, Tone, Atmosphere, & Urgency

22 Thursday Oct 2015

Posted by in Story, Writing

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clockNational Novel Writing Month (NANOWRIMO) is just around the corner—a yearly event in which writers commit to completing a 50,000 word (or more) novel during the month of November. One month. One book. Not a lot of time. So, time as a story element seems like an appropriate blog topic.

Stories unfold over a set interval of time. That’s a given. What I want to discuss is how different types of time can be used as story elements to set mood, further plot, and deepen character. [pc: morguefile.com]

Types of Time

There are four types of time that can be used to add atmosphere, set tone, and increase urgency in a story:

  • Clock time:  Sets mood and creates suspense.
  • Calendar time: Creates a context for events, such as prom, homecoming, and graduation.
  • Seasonal time: Creates atmosphere, as well as providing a backdrop and reason for cultural events and activities.
  • Historical time: Establishes a context for social ideas, behaviors, and attitudes.

These elements can be combined, as you’ll see in the following examples.

Seasonal Atmosphere

Calendar and seasonal time are a natural combination. A season is technicallyCover for A Long Way From Chicago by Richard Peck three months long, allowing the story to unfold during time. Seasonal time can be used to set atmosphere and integrate events particular to the season to further the story. One great example is A Long Way From Chicago by Richard Peck. The story begins in the fall, with a Halloween outhouse scene that is laugh-out-loud hilarious, while also adding depth to the characters.

Home Alone movie posterSeasonal events can also introduce urgency that influence characters’ actions. The movie Home Alone is a perfect example.

When a young boy is accidentally left behind at Christmas–while the family travels to Paris–he is forced to defend their house against burglars, with side-splittingly funny results.

Ticking-Clock ~ Urgency and/or Advocate

You don’t really know a person until you see how they react under extreme pressure. DieHardWhich is why a ticking clock—a figurative pressure cooker—is a great way to reveal character strengths and flaws.

The ticking-clock can be combined with seasonal time. The Christmas party setting in the movie Die Hard is the perfect excuse for the entire company to be at the office headquarters at night with minimal security. It also provides a reason for NYC cop John McClane (Bruce Willis)–the estranged husband of a corporate VP, Holly McClane–to be visiting, so he can then take down the bad guys in badass style.

In the movie Back to the Future, time is both an advocate and adversary. Time is the vehicle (no pun intended) by which teenager Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) travels back into the past to alter the developmental paths of his parents to create a better future for the family. The ticking-clock is BackToTheFuturethe electrical storm required for Marty to escape the past and get back to the future.

As the electrical storm gathers, Marty arrives at the clock tower as a falling branch disconnects the wire from the tower to the street. As Marty races the DeLorean toward the clock tower, Doc climbs across the clock to reconnect the cable. The lightning strikes, sending Marty back to 1985, but not before he sees Doc killed. Marty soon discovers Doc actually survived because of the bullet-proof vest he was wearing. Doc takes Marty home to 1985, then sets off for October 21, 2015 (Back to the Future Day!).

Historical Time

Sent coverHistorical time can define setting, social interactions, attitudes, laws, and mores. There are any number of terrific novels that transport the reader to a different historic time to experience life in another era. What I like about Margaret Haddix‘s Missing series, is the unique spin on historical fiction with a time travel twist.

In Found, the first book in the series, Haddix establishes the plausibility of time travel and the anticipation that the main characters are not who they think they are.  In the second book, Sent, Chip, Alex, Jonah, and Katherine land in 1483 in the Tower of London where the imprisoned Edward and Richard fearfully await their fates. Chip and Alex soon realize that they are princes Edward V and Richard of Shrewsbury, Duke of York–come back from the future. They watch history unfold, trying to save the princes without altering time in a way that would kill them anyway. This book is rich with accurate historical details that bring the setting and characters to life. It also poses a unique possibility regarding the actual fates of Edward and Richard.

 

Secret American History

07 Saturday Jul 2012

Posted by in Historical Fiction, Supernatural, Suspense, Thriller, Vampire

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The REAL Abraham Lincoln … Vampire Hunter

History prefers legends to men … It prefers nobility to brutality … soaring speeches to quiet deeds. History remembers the battle and forgets the blood. However history remembers me before I was a President, it shall only remember a fraction of the truth … [from the trailer below]

The premise of Seth Grahame-Smith’s bestselling novel, Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter, is awesome. Somehow though, I never got around to reading it. So when the movie came out, I had to see it. It was obvious from the trailers that the story was anything but a joke. Still, I couldn’t fathom how — given everything we know about our 16th President — the history could be believable. OK, so you have to buy into the whole Vampire’s-are-real thing. But after that … Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter is disturbingly plausible.

Which got me to thinking … What if? What if … what we’ve been taught about that time in history is only part of the truth? The possibility is awesome.

Hollywood has given us some other more-than-believable options for American history…

A Secret National Treasure Map

National Treasure is a perfect example … A secret from our nation’s past leads to the greatest adventure (and treasure) in history.

Benjamin Gates’ (Nicolas Cage) life-long journey leads him, and his nerd-savante sidekick Riley Poole (Justin Bartha), to an invisible map that is encrypted on the back of the Declaration of Independence.  However, what they thought was the final clue turns out to only be the beginning of their hunt.

Gates soon realizes that to protect the world’s greatest treasure, he must steal the most revered, best guarded document in American history before it falls into the wrong hands. In a race against time, Gates must stay one step ahead of his ruthless adversary (Sean Bean), elude the authorities, and unlock a 2000 year-old mystery behind our greatest national treasure.

What makes this story so believable are the historical facts that are woven into the story at every turn. Nine of the Founding Fathers who signed the Declaration of Independence were Masons. The invisible map (encrypted using Masonic symbols) points to the hiding place of King Solomon’s treasure — an unfathomable storehouse of wealth — that vanished after the Knights Templar (precursors to the Masons) uncovered it beneath King Solomon’s palace.

And let’s not forget the clue Gates discovers on the Independence Hall clock tower on the back of a hundred-dollar bill, or the special glasses needed to read the map — made by Benjamin Franklin himself, the inventor of bifocals — that are hidden in that very clock tower. And the final believability gem (pun intended) comes when Gates realizes the treasure is deep beneath Trinity Church (Trinity Wall Street at 79th Street in Lower Manhattan), which was founded in 1696. Again, the magic of … what if?

More National Treasure … in a Book of Secrets

National Treasure: Book of Secrets starts out with the promise of a great premise…

This time Benjamin Gates sets out to discover the truth behind the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, by uncovering the mystery within the 18 pages missing from assassin John Wilkes Booth’s diary. A Gates ancestor has been accused of being an accomplice in Booth’s crime, and Benjamin  believes the missing pages will clear the family name. His conviction drives him to uncover clues to the location of the mythical City of Gold, Cibola.

The historic facts laced throughout this story are viable. Such as the hidden inscription on the scale model of the Statue of Liberty on the Île aux Cygnes in Paris that points to the two Resolute desks; one of which is in the Queen’s chambers in Buckingham Palace, the other in the Oval Office of the White House. All well and good. But they lost me with the Mayan-style temple of gold beneath Mount Rushmore.

It might just be me. But the only way I’d believe that one is if they proved George Washington used his hatchet to cut crop circles to signal aliens (instead of chopping down that cherry tree). Because the aliens could totally have helped the Mayans build a temple of gold beneath Mount Rushmore. Which of course, is why George’s face is now on that mountain.

But seriously … a city carved into the walls at the bottom of the Grand Canyon — similar to Petra in Jordan — and filled with tons of golden artifacts would have been much more believable. I’m just sayin’. Are you listening, Jon Turteltaub?

I’m hoping National Treasure 3 — if and when it happens — brings the series back on track to its original suspense filled, believable glory. Without aliens, crystal skulls, or nuked refrigerators. Please!

How to lose an audience…

What I learned from these stories was … to keep a story believable the audience needs a consistent trail of plausibility that’s easy to follow. A logical set up of known historical facts woven throughout the story so they pay off in a believable secret history.

Let’s face it. On some level we all want to believe the secret history could be true. We want to believe, because it takes us out of our day-to-day lives and lifts us up into realm of infinite possibilities. That … What if? … place, where anything can happen.

A storyteller’s mistake comes when their plausibility trail hits a wall that requires us to pole vault over it. The end result … you lose us … an audience that wanted to go along for the ride, not go out for the Olympics.

What’s your favorite piece of secret history … American or otherwise?

Inquiring minds want to know!