The Blitz Bus by Glen Blackwell

The Blitz Bus by Glen Blackwell

Zoetrope Books, 2021, 218 pages

NetGalley E-ARC 

When his teacher assigns her class to write a fictional diary entry of a WWII evacuee, Jack, 12, just can't think of anything to write. Somehow, the war seems so long ago and he just can't relate. And now, he's going to be late meeting his best friend, Emmie Langford after school. Being a good friend, Emmie has been waiting at their bus stop when Jack finally shows up.

Everything seems normal until they reached their stop and notice a new blue storefront with a mannequin wearing a long coat and a gas mask in the window. Suddenly, there is a flash of light and it begins to rain heavily, so they head to the nearby Tube station for shelter, along with everyone else.

Everything at the Tube station feels like it's out of time, causing Emmie to think they are in the midst of a film set in 1940. But gradually she and Jack realize they have landed in the midst of a WWII air raid, instead, and that somehow they have traveled back in time. With no money, no food, and no friends, Jack and Emmie begin to try to figure out how they can return to their own time. Along the way, they become friends with Jan, a Polish boy who arrived in England a few years earlier on the Kindertransport. The three discover an old Anderson shelter behind a bombed and abandoned house as Jan helps them navigate this unfamiliar London. When they discover what appears someone trying to build a makeshift radio, they are convinced the mysterious boy/man they have noticed is a German spy. 

The German spy turns out to be Stan, who also arrived in London on the Kindertransport, but unlike Jan, whose foster family is quite kind, Stan's treats him terribly. As they become friends with Jan and Stan, can Jack and Emmie trust them with their secret and perhaps get some ideas of how they can return to the own time? Or will they be stranded in 1940 forever?

The Blitz Bus is an interesting time travel novel that points out how as things recede into history, they don't carry the same level of interest or impact that they once had. Jack may live in East London, which had been heavily bombed and damaged during the war, but he's interested in video games and football, not history. I thought that Blackwell portrayed what London in the Blitz was like quite well, layering it with the different experiences of the two Kindertransport kids, their loneliness and homesickness, emotions Jack comes to appreciate firsthand. 

The novel also points out how people were so suspicious of foreigners during the war that they often suspected them of being spies, just as Jack, Emmie, and Jan thought that about Stan. 

Interestingly, the Tube station that Emmie and Jack shelter in was the Bethnal Green Station which was destroyed in 1943, killing 173 people. Blackwell includes more about it in his back matter, that also includes information on the Kindertransport, and instructions for making the kind of radio out things found, similar to the radio Stan builds to listen to new about Poland. 

I have to admit that I was hoping that once they returned to their own time, Jack and Emmie would try to find out what happened to Jan and Stan, whether they were living, and if they were, did they remember their two time traveling friends? 

Readers looking for a time travel adventure, as well as those who enjoy historical fiction set in WWII will no doubt enjoy reading about Jack and Emmie's exploits in this imaginative novel.

This book was an eARC gratefully received from NetGalley

The Swallows' Flight by Hilary McKay

Yes, The Swallows' Flight is a book about WWII and, yes, it is a companion to the WWI novel The Skylarks' War (Love to Everyone in the US) that told the story of siblings Clarissa (Clarry) and Peter Penrose and their friends, and whose children play a part in this novel.  In fact, this novel revolves around 5 children whose lives eventually come together - Erik and Hans in Berlin, Kate Penrose in Oxford, Ruby in Plymouth, and a scrapyard dog in London, though for the most part, the timeline isn't linear.

In 1931 Berlin, ten-year-olds Erik and Hans are best friends with big plans for the future - Erik plans to become head zookeeper at the Berlin Zoo and Hans plans to open a kiosk outside the zoo and sell strudel. But right now, Erik is collecting flies to feed the young swallows he has just rescued. Hans has an Uncle Karl who introduces the boys to flying, which they love, and eventually causes them to become Luftwaffe pilots even though they never supported Hitler and the Nazis.

Although she comes from a family where the girls are all named after flower, in 1927 Plymouth, England, Violet decides to name her daughter Ruby Amaryllis. Not only does Ruby have a different name, but she is born with red birthmarks scattered over her face, causing her feel self-conscious and to shy away from people as she gets older. As if birthmarks aren't bad enough, older brother Will, 8, has no use for his new sister, and as children, he never lets her forget that. Ruby's mother Violet's best friend is Clarry Penrose from Oxford, who is given the honest of becoming Ruby's godmother. 

Peter Penrose, now a doctor has married Vanessa and they have six children, including Kate, born in 1928 and who is their youngest. As it happened, Clarry is also Kate's godmother. Into this mix is unofficial cousin Rupert, who is as exciting and interesting to the Penrose children as is Han's Uncle Karl to him and Erik. But Kate is the only one who doesn't get to experience any adventures with Rupert. Kate is a sickly child, with lung problems and a constant cough, and by the time she would have been old enough, WWII had begun. But she is also inquisitive and a keen observer, and begins to keep a diary of everything that happens to everyone else. 

Dog lives in East London and no one knows just how old he is. He is kept chained up in the scrapyard, and is supposed to bark away potential thieves, but dreams of running free. The only kindness he experiences is the scrapyard girl who at least acknowledges him with an occasional "hello, dog" and who, at the start of the war, attaches a luggage tag to his collar with the name Pax burned into it. Not long after, Pax is released to fend for himself, but luckily meets the kindhearted Rupert. 

The story that unfolds is told in alternating chapters that recounts how the war impacts the lives of each of these five character until their lives converge. It's an unusual format, but one the works beautifully and the non-linear timeline is not at all confusing.  Don't worry if you haven't read the first book. While it is well worth reading, The Swallows' Flight stands alone and there is a even brief family tree for each of the human characters.  

McKay's writing is just beautiful and she has skillfully created a heartwarming, inspiration novel that includes appealing character's with distinct characteristics and personalities. There is just enough information about what is going on in the world, especially Germany, to give historical context to the individual stories. There is a glossary in the back matter as well as some historical background. 

The Swallows' Flight is available now in the UK and will be available in the US on October 19, 2021

This book is recommended for readers age 9+

This book was purchased for my personal library

Mei Ling in China City/Mei Ling en la Ciudad China by Icy Smith, illustrated by Gayle Garner Roski

Mei Ling in China City/Mei Ling en la Ciudad China

written by Icy Smith, illustrated by Gayle Garner Roski

East West Discovery Press, 2020, 47 pages

An interesting story about the real life for one Chinese American girl in 1942.

It's September 1942, and Chinese American Mei Ling, 12, is missing her best friend Yayeko Akiyama. Because she is Japanese American Yayeko, her family and all west coast persons of Japanese ancestry have been sent to what the government calls relocation centers after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 and the United States entered World War II. The Akiyamas were sent to the Manzanar War Relocation Center at the foot of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in California, she writes to Mei Ling.

In their exchange of letters, Yayeko says she is bored in Manzanar, where there is no school yet, and she wakes up with dust all over her face every morning. No only that but she has not privacy - they live in a barracks, meals are in a mess hall, even the showers and latrines lacked privacy.  

Mei Ling Lee, who lives in China City in Los Angeles, is getting ready to celebrate the Moon Festival. Putting on her red silk dress, so that she can help out in the family restaurant Chung Dat Loo, Mei Ling is sent on some errands. 

First, she is to pick up more paper lanterns to decorate the restaurant, and then stop at the bakery for more moon cakes. On her way there, Mei Ling stops at the Kuan Yin Temple to say hi to her friend Johnny Yee. Johnny is selling fortune telling sticks and incense for seven cents to tourists. Later he will perform the traditional lion dance in the big Moon Festival parade. 

Mei Ling also runs into her friends Ruby, Francis and Doris selling American Flags and Chinese opera tickets for $1.00 to raise money for the United China Relief Fund to help the women and children refugees in China, suffering under Japanese occupation. Naturally, Mei Ling offers to sell some of both at the restaurant. The person who sells the most wins a new Chinese silk jacket and a $100. Chinese banquet gift certificate.

But when Ruby comes by the restaurant later, she tells Mei Ling that someone has already raised more than $70. and will probably win. Mei Ling decides to offer a free glass of orange juice with each flag and opera ticket. Setting up her stand outside the restaurant, she and Ruby are very surprised when Chinese actress Anna May Wong stops by for a flag and ticket, then pays with a $300. check making Mei Ling the winner. 

Mei Ling writes to Yayeko in Manzanar and tells her that she is giving her the new jacket and saving the gift certificate for when she returns home. 

That is the basic story about Mei Ling, her friend Yayeko, and the day of the Moon Festival (which was September 24, 1942), but there is so much more information packed into the bilingual picture book for older readers. China City, where Mei Ling lives, was a bustling area before it was destroyed by fire in 1949. And you can practically draw a map of her day as she does her errands, but you don't have to because you will find one on the endpapers.  

Many of the Asian Americans who lived in China City also worked as extras in movies, including Mei Ling and her friend Johnny Yee, and an  actors' agent, Mr. Gubbins, has his office there. So it may be why it is not surprising that Anna May Wong was at the Moon Festival.

There is so much more Chinese culture and tradition packed into Mei Ling's story. Much of it can be found in the phenomenal illustrations by Gayle Garner Roski (1941-2020). Though she wasn't of Chinese ancestry, her boldly colored watercolor illustrations and realistic settings throughout this book really capture what China City looked and felt like in 1943. 

There is also extensive back matter that includes many photographs and additional information. Mei Ling and Yayeko lost touch over the years, but were reunited in their 90s thanks to the original publication of Mei Ling in China City in 2008

A 1940s photo of the restaurant owned by Mei Ling's family

Besides this new bilingual English/Spanish edition of Mei Ling in China City, it is also available in English/Chinese and English/Japanese editions.

This book is recommended for readers age 7+

This book was borrowed from a friend

 

Keep Calm and Carry On, Children by Sharon K. Mayhew

It's September 7, 1940 and the sound of the air raid sirens has just begun throughout London. For Joyce Munsey, 11, and her younger sister Gina, 6, that means getting out of their beds and heading out to the backyard and the makeshift, shelter that their dad had dug there, as bombs begin to fall. By September 10th, after witnessing the destruction the bombs had brought into their lives and neighborhood, and after the loss of two neighbors, Joyce's parent decide it time for their daughters to join the next trainload of school children being evacuated to the countryside. On September 11, 1940, Joyce and Gina, unable to even wash up after the previous night's bombing, board a train at Euston Station heading who knows where with a number of other children.

On the journey, the two sisters meet Sam Purdy, 11, and Molly Neal, 12, and after hours and hours of riding, the four of them disembark in a place called Leek. As people look over the evacuees, Sam is chosen quickly by an elderly man who claims to need someone who can help him now that his boys are away fighting. Molly is next, chosen by an elderly lady who likes her humor and cheekiness. And just as Joyce and Gina begin getting worried they would be left behind, a woman and her daughter Phyllis Woods, 10, decide to take in the sisters.

Joyce and Gina's placement works out very nicely, and Phyllis proves to be an instant friend. After a few days, they decide to call on Sam and Molly, to see if they can come out and play for a while. But when they find out he is living with a Mr. Badderly, Phyllis recognizes the name and tells Joyce he isn't a very nice person.

Sure enough, he has Sam working hard in his victory garden and won't let him leave until Joyce, Phyllis, and later Molly help Sam finish his chores. When they finally get away from Mr. Badderly, Sam tells them how badly he is being treated, even forced to sleep in the cellar. But when Sam, Molly, Joyce, and Phyllis discover a hut full of items that are now being rationed, they realize these are things being sold on the black market. I think no one will be surprised to discover who the ringleader of the black marketeers is. But what can a group a kids do about these ruthless crooks?

Keep Calm and Carry On, Children is an interesting story, with lots of everyday details about the early days of the Blitz, and the fear, worry, and trepidation that children must have felt at being sent to strangers in the countryside and away from their family. Many of the evacuees in the book arrived in the countryside in dirty clothes and not have washed, because as the bombing in London increased, the water and gas lines were damaged. That is something I never encountered in a WWII novel about evacuees before. Also, it was so surprising to learn that Joyce and Gina had never used a toothbrush until living with the Woods family. I wonder how common that might have been. The Munsey family was poor in London, and at times, Joyce feels so embarrassment because of it, but was never made to feel bad by Phyllis or her mother.

It took some time to get to the part about the black market and Mr. Badderly's mistreatment of Sam, which sadly really did happen to some of evacuees. I think some of the early details could have been edited out without spoiling the story. Also there were mistakes in the ARC I read, which will hopefully be fixed in the final copy, but it was nothing that would ruin the basic story.

Mayhew's story was inspired by her grandfather's family, when his parents took in two evacuees from London during the war. And one final thing: though she used the slogan in her title, to her credit, Mayhew didn't use it in the story. Keep Calm and Carry On was only to be used in case of invasion, and that never happened.

Keep Calm and Carry On, Children is a novel that should interest young readers interested in history, especially WWII history.

This book is recommended for readers age 9+
This book was an EARC received from NetGalley