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ENEMIES IN THE ORCHARD

Name: ENEMIES IN THE ORCHARD
Author: Dana VanderLugt
ISBN: 9780310155775

A WORLD WAR 2 NOVEL IN VERSE

by Dana VanderLugt ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 12, 2023

An emotionally layered vision of a difficult moment in history.

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In a Michigan apple orchard in 1944, a German soldier and an American girl reflect on wartime life.

Claire DeBoer, a careworn 13-year-old Dutch American girl, bears countless responsibilities on her family’s farm and dreams of one day becoming a nurse. Karl Hartmann, a teenage German prisoner of war, arrives in Michigan to do agricultural work through a federal program. The book opens with atmospheric poems introducing each protagonist, effectively using George Ella Lyon’s “Where I’m From” format. This reflective verse novel alternates their perspectives as it explores their intersecting lives. Claire’s brother is fighting in Europe, so the dissonance of enemy soldiers on her farm feels like a cruel joke. Karl is awakening to the immensity of Nazi atrocities and anti-American propaganda, though some of his more nationalistic fellow prisoners are determined to make him suffer. Calm and dread intertwine: The soothing harvest-time rhythms intermingle with the ever-present threat of tremendous loss. Karl and Claire, having lost their youths to a global conflict, discover a tenuous friendship; the hinted-at mutual romantic feelings between an eighth grader and someone described as “almost a man” might cause some discomfort. VanderLugt’s reflections on war’s personal toll and the tensions of having enemy troops working in America offer opportunities for readers to consider matters from many angles. An author’s note describes her inspiration—the German POWs who worked in her own grandfather’s fruit orchards during the war.

An emotionally layered vision of a difficult moment in history. (sources) (Verse historical fiction. 10-14)

Pub Date: Sept. 12, 2023

ISBN: 9780310155775

Page Count: 288

Publisher: Zonderkidz

Review Posted Online: July 26, 2023

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2023

Categories:

CHILDREN'S HISTORICAL FICTION | CHILDREN'S POETRY

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Awards & Accolades

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Kirkus Reviews'
Best Books Of 2017

New York Times Bestseller

Sydney Taylor Book Award Winner

REFUGEE

by Alan Gratz ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 25, 2017

Poignant, respectful, and historically accurate while pulsating with emotional turmoil, adventure, and suspense.

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Awards & Accolades

Likes

18

Our Verdict

GET IT

Google Rating

Kirkus Reviews'
Best Books Of 2017

New York Times Bestseller

Sydney Taylor Book Award Winner

In the midst of political turmoil, how do you escape the only country that you’ve ever known and navigate a new life? Parallel stories of three different middle school–aged refugees—Josef from Nazi Germany in 1938, Isabel from 1994 Cuba, and Mahmoud from 2015 Aleppo—eventually intertwine for maximum impact.

Three countries, three time periods, three brave protagonists. Yet these three refugee odysseys have so much in common. Each traverses a landscape ruled by a dictator and must balance freedom, family, and responsibility. Each initially leaves by boat, struggles between visibility and invisibility, copes with repeated obstacles and heart-wrenching loss, and gains resilience in the process. Each third-person narrative offers an accessible look at migration under duress, in which the behavior of familiar adults changes unpredictably, strangers exploit the vulnerabilities of transients, and circumstances seem driven by random luck. Mahmoud eventually concludes that visibility is best: “See us….Hear us. Help us.” With this book, Gratz accomplishes a feat that is nothing short of brilliant, offering a skillfully wrought narrative laced with global and intergenerational reverberations that signal hope for the future. Excellent for older middle grade and above in classrooms, book groups, and/or communities looking to increase empathy for new and existing arrivals from afar.

Poignant, respectful, and historically accurate while pulsating with emotional turmoil, adventure, and suspense. (maps, author’s note) (Historical fiction. 10-14)