Saturday 23 June 2012

Pennies for Hitler by Jackie French

Although I have enjoyed a number of Jackie French books over the years, I haven't thought of her writing as being particularly elegant or sparkling. I usually consider her writing to be more prosaic and deliberate than beautiful.

She writes marvelous historical fiction for children, but there are times when you can see her formula at work.

However, Pennies for Hitler has proven to be a cut above the rest so far.

The story of young Georg fleeing Germany alone, in fear of his life just as WW2 is about to start, is engrossing and at times, almost poetic.

I give you pg 110 "Crashes shook the air - different crashes now, not the dull roar of bombs but long slow crumbles as buildings stopped trying to stand up." 

and pg 147 "and that too high, too blue sky was new as well. A tiny cloud was creeping into it now, looking timid against all that blue."

pg 252 "The war dragged on, dragging the year with it".

Pennies for Hitler is a fine example of Jackie French at her best.
This is not a sequel to Hitler's Daughter. The only link is WW2 and the themes of identity, war and loss.



4 comments:

  1. Hi, I have tagged you for the Liebster award(:
    Head over to curseofthebibliophile.blogspot.com to see your tag. I can’t wait to see your answers (:

    ReplyDelete
  2. Haha - I just came by to let you know that I, too, have tagged you for the Liebster Blog Award! Doesn't hurt to be tagged twice, tough! You can check out the post here

    ReplyDelete
  3. I have a growing admiration for Jackie French. I've only scratched the tip of the surface of her historical fiction. I loved Nanberry last year, it was one of my favourite books of the year. I'm not familiar with this one, but will keep it in mind. I was wondering if it was related to Hitler's Daughter thanks for clarifying that.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. My favourite JF so far, is the first one I read when I started in the bookshop - A Rose for the ANZACS. It was a wonderful story about 3 girls who went to France to nurse during WW1 - I would highly recommend it if you haven't got to it already :-)

      Delete

This blog has now moved to Wordpress.
Please visit This Reading Life to comment.

Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.