Touched by Fire

Touched by Fire by Irene N. Watts
4/5 stars
Tundra Books, 2013
197 pages
MG Historical

Source: Received an e-ARC via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I'm a huge historical fiction fan so I always try to stay aware of the newest books for young readers especially when they're in an atypical time period. We've seen a lot of the Edwardian age and the 1920s lately, especially seeing some glamour from the period but a lot less about the darker side like the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire that anchors this book.

The book opens in Kiev 1905 and follows a Jewish family escaping a pogrom by moving to Berlin where they plan to save up to eventually reach America. This occurs in 1910 when daughter Miriam arrives and quickly gains employment at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory where the infamous fire occurs.

Honestly I thought a lot more of this book would focus on the fire but the majority of it is on their life in Europe, facing prejudices, looking forward to a freer life in America. It covers all the work they do to save up enough money and the rumors they sift through about what life might be like once they arrive. I thought some elements definitely seemed sugarcoated or simplified for its target audience. As a sometimes cynical reader, I was consistently surprised by how nice everyone was. I kept thinking maybe someone would try to rob Miriam or physically threaten her and while such occurrences are referenced, she is mostly safe as she can be.

The ending was especially interesting. It is an epilogue jumping forward to 1933 Nazi Germany and looking at Miriam's nephew. I loved how it reinforced the themes of bigotry against Jewish people which has been so important throughout the book as well as following up on some foreshadowing from earlier in the book. At first I thought it was odd or that it was serving as set-up to a sort of sequel to this book but upon further reflection, I found it satisfactory.

While I found this book quite pleasant, it didn't have the emotional punch to the gut I would have liked to really connect with its contents. Everything just felt so young. I feel like this may be better suited for its target audience, which I would classify as middle-grade. It could serve as an introduction to the period, to antisemitism, to life for immigrants, to labor conditions, etc.

Other Opinions:
Flashlight Commentary
Ms. Yingling Reads

Man Overboard!

Man Overboard! by Curtis Parkinson
Tundra Books, 2012
152 pages
YA; Historical
4/5 stars

Source: Received an e-ARC via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

This book caught my eye when I noticed that it was set during WWII; I didn't really read beyond that but I figured boating and war is an interesting combination.

Thus I got to be surprised to discover that this book is set in Canada on a riverboat between Prescott and Montreal where two best friends have secured jobs for the summer of 1943 as most of the other men are off at war.  Scott and Adam become involved in preventing German espionage, inspired by the real-life fact of German agents arriving in Canada to promote their war effort.

In the beginning, everything happens very quickly. Scott accidentally stumbles upon the secret German agents and is threatened, an Allied agent "falls" overboard, and Adam is kidnapped in place of Scott as leverage to keep Scott quiet. Then there felt like a rather long stretch of the novel where Scott worried about what to do and Adam held tight while waiting for an opportunity to escape. For the end though it picked up as they scrambled to rescue Adam and to prevent anything bad from stopping the Canadian war effort.

On the surface, this was a really fun book with some cool historical facts and great villains-I am always in favor of making Nazis the bad guys because they are the quintessential bad guys of the twentieth-century (this also holds true for movies: see the good Indiana Jones films and the recent Captain America). But Adam and Scott did not feel like real people to me; they were just characters doing x in service of y plot line. Generally when I love a book, it is because of the passion the characters inspire in me and this book just didn't have it.

Overall: A fun historical story about a lesser-discussed part of WWII.

Cover: I really like the bold font for the title and author-I think it calls out to the reader and grabs the attention.