Tag: Historical Fiction
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Book Review: The Songbird and the Rambutan Tree
by Lucille Abendanon publisher’s synopsis Batavia, Dutch East Indies, 1942. Emmy has the voice of an angel but hasn’t sung a note since a family tragedy. With war looming, her father plans to ship her off to a singing school in England for safety. But all Emmy wants to do is stay in Batavia with…
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Book Review: Hope in the Valley
by Mitali Perkins publisher’s synopsis Twelve-year-old Indian-American Pandita Paul doesn’t like change. She’s not ready to start middle school and leave the comforts of childhood behind. Most of all, Pandita doesn’t want to feel like she’s leaving her mother, who died a few years ago, behind. After a falling out with her best friend, Pandita…
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Book Review: A Place to Hang the Moon
by Kate Albus publisher’s synopsis It is 1940 and William, 12, Edmund, 11, and Anna, 9, aren’t terribly upset by the death of the not-so-grandmotherly grandmother who has taken care of them since their parents died. But the children do need a guardian, and in the dark days of World War II London, those are…
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Book Review: I Must Betray You
by Ruta Sepetys publisher’s synopsis Romania, 1989. Communist regimes are crumbling across Europe. Seventeen-year-old Cristian Florescu dreams of becoming a writer, but Romanians aren’t free to dream; they are bound by rules and force. Amidst the tyrannical dictatorship of Nicolae Ceaușescu in a country governed by isolation and fear, Cristian is blackmailed by the secret police…
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Book Review: The Sound of Light
by Sarah Sudin publisher’s synopsis When the Germans march into Denmark, Baron Henrik Ahlefeldt exchanges his nobility for anonymity, assuming a new identity so he can secretly row messages for the Danish Resistance across the waters to Sweden. American physicist Dr. Else Jensen refuses to leave Copenhagen and abandon her research–her life’s dream. While printing…
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Book Review: Within These Lines
by Stephanie Morrill Publisher’s synopsis: Evalina Cassano’s life in an Italian-American family in 1941 is everything it “should be” until she falls in love with Taichi Hamasaki, the son of Japanese immigrants. Despite the scandal it would cause and that inter-racial marriage is illegal in California, Evalina and Taichi vow they will find a way…
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Book Review: The Fountains of Silence
by Ruta Sepetys publisher’s synopsis A portrait of love, silence, and secrets under a Spanish dictatorship. Madrid, 1957. Under the fascist dictatorship of General Francisco Franco, Spain is hiding a dark secret. Meanwhile, tourists and foreign businessmen flood into Spain under the welcoming promise of sunshine and wine. Among them is eighteen-year-old Daniel Matheson, the…
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Book Review: The Star That Always Stays
by Anna Rose Johnson publisher’s synopsis When bright and spirited Norvia moves from the country to the city, she has to live by one new rule: Never let anyone know you’re Ojibwe. Growing up on Beaver Island, Grand-pere told Norvia stories–stories about her ancestor Migizi, about Biboonke-o-nini the Wintermaker, about the Crane Clan and the…
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Book Review: The Italian Ballerina
by Kristy Cambron Publisher’s Synopsis A prima ballerina. Two American medics. And a young Jewish girl with no name . . . At the height of the Nazi occupation of Rome, an unlikely band of heroes comes together to save Italian Jews in this breathtaking World War II novel based on real historical events. Rome,…
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Book Review: One Degree of Freedom
by Taryn R. Hutchinson publisher’s synopsis Fifteen-year-old Adriana Nicu lives in the sheltered world of Bucharest, Romania, in the year 1987. Under the rule of Communist president Nicolae Ceaușescu, citizens of Bucharest live with the eyes and ears of the government ever present. Adriana’s future, which will involve becoming an engineer, is locked in against…
Hailey Huntington 