Making Bombs for Hitler
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- $6.99
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- $6.99
Publisher Description
For readers who were enthralled by Alan Gratz's PRISONER B-3087 comes a gripping novel about a lesser-known part of WWII.Lida thought she was safe. Her neighbors wearing the yellow star were all taken away, but Lida is not Jewish. She will be fine, won't she?But she cannot escape the horrors of World War II.Lida's parents are ripped away from her and she is separated from her beloved sister, Larissa. The Nazis take Lida to a brutal work camp, where she and other Ukrainian children are forced into backbreaking labor. Starving and terrified, Lida bonds with her fellow prisoners, but none of them know if they'll live to see tomorrow.When Lida and her friends are assigned to make bombs for the German army, Lida cannot stand the thought of helping the enemy. Then she has an idea. What if she sabotaged the bombs... and the Nazis? Can she do so without getting caught?And if she's freed, will she ever find her sister again?This pulse-pounding novel of survival, courage, and hope shows us a lesser-known piece of history -- and is sure to keep readers captivated until the last page.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Originally published in Canada in 2012, this grim novel from Skrypuch (Last Airlift) offers an inside look at a little-known aspect of WWII: the Nazis' capture of millions of non-Jewish youths, many of them Ukrainian, who were forced to become slave laborers, known as Ostarbeiters. While most were older teenagers or in their 20s, some were as young as 12 or younger, like 10-year-old narrator Lida, who pretends to be 13 to avoid an even-worse fate. Orphaned before the book opens, Lida and her five-year-old sister, Larissa, are separated in the early pages; after that, Lida and her fellow child laborers endure relentless days of cruelty cold, hunger, filth, abuse, and grueling work punctuated by deaths. Transferred from one taxing assignment to another, the children form deep bonds, supporting and caring for each other, but Lida's desperate anxiety about Larissa is a constant heavy backdrop to her bleak existence, and to the novel. The story's unyielding harshness is somewhat mitigated by its strong undercurrent of friendship and loyalty; an author's note gives further background on this important piece of history. Ages 8 12.
