The Last Train by Rona Arato

The story open in April 1944, as Paul Auslander's father has been taken away to a work camp along with all the other Jewish men. Five-year-old Paul and his ten-year-old brother Oscar live in Karcag, Hungary. Their small town had a Catholic and a Protestant church as well as a synagogue. Everyone got along regardless of their religion. However, their last name means foreigner and Paul's father has often stated that they will always be Jews first and Hungarians second. 

At the synagogue, Paul and his family as well as the other Jewish families are told that they must adhere to a five-o'clock curfew and that their businesses and schools are now closed. They are to go home to await further instructions.

On April 27, the Jews of Karcag were told that they would be moved to an area at the edge of town, creating a ghetto. Along with Paul, Oscar and their mother, their Auntie Bella and six-year-old Kati and four-year-old Magdi would be living with them.

In the ghetto, Oscar's friend Gabor informs Lenke and Aunt Bella  that he has heard that the Jews are being placed on trains. Terrified the two women are determined to remain strong and not show their fear to Paul and the others. The gendarmes order everyone into the street and march them to the town square where they stand for hours in the hot sun without food or water. Eventually everyone is placed into the back of six canvas covered trucks that take them to the Szolnok Sugar Factory. Here a line of boxcars sat on train tracks. After three hungry days, Paul and his family were ordered into the boxcars by the gendarmes and the dreaded Schutzstaffel or SS. 

At the train station in Vienna, Austria, Paul becomes separated from his mother and Oscar. Oscar and his mother were forced into a new boxcar, while Paul ended up in another. Eventually they were reunited at the Strasshof Concentration camp in Austria. There are stripped and hosed down. For two weeks they remained in the cold barracks at the camp, fed stale bread and watery soup. In July 1944 they are taken to Guntersdorf, Austria and trucked to work on a farm growing and harvesting sugar beets. However, by September Anyu, Paul and Oscar's mother becomes ill.

On October 30, Paul turns six years old. His mother however, is growing weaker every day. In December 1944, Paul and his family were transported back to the Strasshof camp. On December 7 1944, Paul and his family along with his Aunt Bella and her two daughters arrive at Bergen Belsen Concentration Camp in Germany. Still dressed in summer clothing, Paul and Oscar shiver uncontrollably as they are made to walk to the filthy, rank barracks where this is no stove for heating. Every day they were marched outside to stand for hours in the cold.

One day Anyu saw that Uncle Elemir was in the men's camp. Despite being forbidden to sneak to the men's area, Paul goes to visit Uncle Elemir who teaches him how to whittle. By March of 1945, news that Germany was losing the war came to the camp. In April, 1945, despite the fact that the Germans were losing the war, more and more prisoners were being transferred to Bergen-Belsen. Every day hundreds died of typhus. Paul saw the pits with dead bodies whenever he went to visit his uncle. On April 9, Paul, Oscar and Anyu were put into one boxcar, one of many on a train that travelled slowly with many stops. Outside of Farsleben, Germany the soldiers were setting up machine guns to kill them when suddenly they flee ahead of an American tank.

The American soldiers help Paul, Oscar, Anyu and all the others out of the boxcar. The train has stopped in the middle of a field with a low hill nearby. The American soldiers bring people from the nearby German town to the train. When the Germans refuse to help the Jewish people, the American soldier threatens to kill their mayor if they do not provide the Jews with food, clothing, soap and a place to stay. Anyu was taken to a special hospital in Hillersleben along with Paul and Oscar. They remained there for four months until they were sent back to Hungary by the Russians who now controlled Eastern Europe. 

On the train ride to Budapest, Anyu has recovered along with Bella, Kati, Magdi, and Paul, but Oscar has a bad cough. In Budapest, Anyu and Oscar are taken to hospital as they are both still very ill, and Paul is allowed to stay, only if he has his tonsils out. Apu returns to Budapest

Discussion

The Last Train tells Paul Arato's family's story in a gentle way that still captures some of the fear and confusion his family experienced when their native Hungary was invaded by the Nazis in 1944. Prior to this, Hungary was pro-fascist and had been allied with Germany, supporting its Nazi policies. Until that time, Jews in Hungary were mainly protected from the Nazi's Final Solution policies, although they faced economic and political sanctions. Hungary participated in Hitler's invasion of communist Russia. But when Hitler discovered that Hungary was attempting to broker a peace treaty with the Allied Forces, he invaded and almost immediately began rounding up the Jewish population. This is where Paul's story begins. Paul's story, like that of many Holocaust survivors would remain untold but never forgotten, for years. The Last Train recovers one such story and how it came to be told is worth revealing.

In 2001, students at Hudson Valley High School were assigned to interview local residents and family members about World War II as part of a history class run by teacher Mark Rozell.  He wanted to make history come alive for his students in a more meaningful way and he also believed that history has some important lessons to teach young people. When the students interviewed American veterans they came across an unbelievable story about the liberation of a train holding 2500 Jewish prisoners, many sick, all starving and filthy.

It was during an interview in July, 2001 with Carrol Walsh, who on April 13, 1945, was a 24 year old American tank commander with the American 30th Infantry Division, that Rozell learned about the American liberation of a large transport train near Magdeburg. Walsh had not thought about the train until his daughter urged him to tell the history teacher about it during the interview. Soldiers had uncovered an incredible situation; boxcars jam-packed with starving Jewish prisoners. The historic liberation was recorded in photographs taken by George C. Gross, a friend and fellow tank commander who, unlike Walsh, stayed with the train overnight and into the next day. Gross' unit went to the local German's and ordered them to provide food and lodgings for the Jewish survivors.

Survivors leaving the train.

Walsh also related that he received the 30th Division newsletters and one of those newsletters had published a letter from a survivor of a "death train" asking if anyone was there when it was liberated. It turned out that this was the same train near Magdeburg that Walsh, Gross and also Major Benjamin had liberated. Walsh wrote to the editor and advised them that a better contact would be George Gross.

Rozell then contacted tank commander George Gross who was now living in San Diego, California and working as a professor of English. Dr. Gross had a negative of the most famous picture as well as ten other photographs of the liberation of the train. Rozell was then able to hear Gross' account of his time spent at the train near Magdeburg. The teacher created a website containing the interviews where they sat for four years before being noticed by a survivor from Australia. Since then the website interviews, along with help from 1st Lt. Frank Towers, has been a focal point for reuniting survivors and their liberators in a series of reunions. Many of these survivors had searched for years, in vain, for some information about their liberators and the train. 

This background sets the stage for this tiny but very informative narrative nonfiction book, The Last Train, which has been written for children, by Rona Arato who is the wife of Paul Arato, who was on the Magdeburg Train when he was just five years old.  These trains were called "the last trains" because they contained the survivors of the Nazi concentration camps who were being shunted around in an attempt by the Nazi's to exterminate the evidence of their crimes against humanity.

Arato writes that her husband's story only came out after his son, Daniel, found Rozell's website. Although she knew about Paul's past, he had never told their children, Alise, Daniel and Debbie. It was a haunting memory that she did not press him to divulge. Arato's retelling of Paul's experiences as a young child in the concentration camps is simple yet compelling. The Last Train is not graphic yet convey in some measure the terrible conditions endured, the cruelty of the German SS troops who would murder simply on a whim. This is seen when a young boy, happy that it is his birthday, is shot point blank in the head by an SS officer. Although The Last Train is about a real event, Arato has recreated much of the dialogue based on interviews and research. This has resulted in a well-written, concise account of a little known event in the liberation of Europe.

Paul's immediate family was lucky in that they all survived, although his mother never fully recovered her health and died in 1951. However, most of his extended family were murdered in the Holocaust. Eventually Paul and Oscar escaped communist Hungary, with Paul coming to Canada and Oscar travelling to Australia. Arato has included many photographs both of her family before and after the war, the liberation of the transport train near Magdeburg and the reunion of Jewish survivors and American liberators some sixty years later which help young readers understand this important historical event. 

Image of mother and child: https://teachinghistorymatters.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/moment-of-liberation1.jpg

Book Details:
The Last Train by Rona Arato
Toronto: Owlkids Books Inc.     2013
142 pp.

SYLO by D.J. MacHale

MacHale is both a well known television producer and children's author, having written the Pendragon series as well as the Morpheus Road trilogy. SYLO, a novel about a group of teens trying to uncover the mysterious situation developing on their island, reads like a well written television script. It's smooth, with thrilling pulses of adventure set at exactly the right points to keep the reader moving along.

The novel is set on (fictional) idyllic Pemberwick Island off the coast of Maine. The cast of characters includes fourteen year old Tucker Pierce and his best friend, Quinn Carr. Both Tucker and Quinn are transplants to Pemberwick Island. Tucker's family moved from Greenwich, Connecticut after his father who was a civil engineer,  lost his job, while Quinn's parents who are ER doctors moved from Philadephia to enjoy a less stressful work life.

Besides Tucker and Quinn, several other people round out their circle of friends. There's Kent Berringer, a junior who plays middle linebacker on the school football team and whose parents own the nicest hotel, The Blackbird, on Pemberwick Island. Kent is often hostile and bullying towards Tucker who isn't as athletic as the linebacker. Olivia Kinsey is from New York City and has been spending the summer with her mother on Pemberwick Island. She is older than Tucker and attends a prep school in New York. Tucker knows her because she is staying at The Blackbird and he often works on the grounds of the hotel. Tucker also knows cute, but odd, Tori Sleeper, whose father runs a lobster business. Todd is crushing on her but too shy to get to know Tori.

The story opens with a high school football game that turns deadly. Arbortown High freshman, Tucker watches as senior tailback, Marty Wiggins, has the game of his life. But whenever Marty returns to the sidelines, he looks anything but normal. Frenzied and wild might be more apt. Seconds after scoring another touch-down, Marty drops dead. But that is only the beginning of the mysterious happenings on Pemberwick Island.

That same night Tucker and Quinn go for one of their clandestine bike rides around the island and encounter an incredible sight, a strange dark shadow flying near the island's coast accompanied by faint musical notes. But when a brilliant streak of light destroys the shadow in a devastating explosion, Tucker and Quinn, shocked by what they have just seen, report what has happened to the local sheriff. No answers are supplied and inexplicably, the Coast Guard takes over the investigation.

Meanwhile, Tucker knows that there was something strange about Marty's death and he soon learns that Marty took a substance called "Ruby". He finds this out from a stranger, Ken Feit, who was at the football game and who approaches Tucker,  tells him about Ruby and lets him try it. Ruby is a physical performance enhancing drug that works like no other, giving a person the ability to move and react super fast. But Marty took too much and it killed him.

A few days after this, life on Pemberwick Island changes forever. After a second death occurs during the annual Lobster Pot Festival, the island is invaded by a secret branch of the United States Navy called SYLO. Both tourists and residents alike are told that there have been several deaths due to an unknown virus. The soldier in charge of the quarantine and blockade of the island, Colonel Granger, tells people that no one is allowed on or off the island. Not only are troops mobilized on their island, but the entire island is surrounded by warships.

However, Tucker and Quinn begin to wonder if the invasion has something to do with what they saw the night Marty died. Tucker and Tori witness several incidents of SYLO using lethal force against the islanders as well as taking people away. Olivia tells Tucker that she has seen people taken away from the Blackbird Inn. Soon communications with the mainland are cut.  As they begin to search for clues as to what's going on, both Tucker and Quinn struggle to determine who they can trust. It now seems that both their parents have not been forthcoming with them about what they know. And Granger is now after both of them because it seems they know too much.

Yet for Tucker and Quinn, the information they do have only leads to more questions; what is Ruby and is it related to the quarantine? is there really a virus? why are they completely cut off from the outside world? what was the black shadow they saw? why the use of deadly force on anyone trying to escape?

Tucker and Quinn decide that they have to try to escape from Pemberwick Island and let the outside world know what's going on. They formulate a plan to try to escape, and seek the help of Tori Sleeper.

SYLO is a thrilling read that combines adventure, mystery and science fiction. Each revelation in the story leads to more questions, egging the reader to continue onward. The hook pulling readers in is the death of Marty combined with the mysterious UFO sighting by Tucker and Quinn. From there on, there are more questions than answers.

The characters in SYLO, although typical, are well drawn. Tucker is believable as a fourteen year old boy, new to the football team, shy around girls and not certain about his life. He's the opposite of Quinn who is intelligent, outspoken and who seems to know what he wants in life, when he brags to Tucker that he knows he will do something great some day. Quinn was my favourite character. However, Tucker grows during the book, becoming more self-assured and determined.

Tori was intelligent, quick thinking and physically strong. In contrast, Olivia wasn't as practical minded, a softer more typical female character, but strong in her own way.

Colonel Granger, the bad-ass head of the Pemberwick operation, made me think of Colonel Miles Quaritch from Avatar. He's bold, has a short fuse and doesn't tolerate dissent.

This new YA series will have great appeal to teenage boys. It's a rollercoaster ride of suspense, with touches of humour, some tragedy, a heart-pounding climax and a hanging ending that leads nicely into the next installment due out March 2014.

Book Details:
SYLO by D.J. MacHale
Toronto: Razorbill, Penguin Group     2013
407 pp.

Documentary DVD: Orchestra of Exiles

Orchestra of Exiles recounts the efforts of  violin virtuoso, Bronislaw Huberman, to rescue the best Jewish musicians from prewar Germany and Europe to form a new orchestra in Palestine. It is a story few people outside the Jewish community remember. The documentary, which is 85 minutes in length, was written and directed by Josh Aronson, who himself is a renowned musician, a concert pianist, married to violinist Maria Bachmann.

Orchestra of Exiles begins by tracing the early musical formation of Bronislaw Huberman who was born into a poor Jewish family in 1882 in Czestochowa, Poland. Bronislaw's father was known for his bad temper but also for his passion for music. 

When Huberman was eight, his musical abilities were very much evident so his father took him to Berlin, Germany to find the best teacher and he began his studies the following year with Joseph Joachim.

In 1894, Huberman was invited to perform at Adelina Patti's farewell party and she gave him an outstanding review. His father stopped his lessons to start Huberman's career and Huberman achieved early fame at the age of 13 when he played the Brahms Violin Concerto in January of 1896. Brahms attended the concert and was so impressed he was moved to tears. Huberman played all over the world including America, Europe and Russia and he was soon acknowledged as a virtuoso.

The devastation of World War I changed Huberman, rousing his political consciousness and making him an ardent Pan-European, that is someone who believed in uniting all of Europe. He cancelled all his concerts for two years to study at the Sorbonne. During the interwar years, in 1922, the Pan-European movement which called for the unity of European states for peace was growing. In 1929, Huberman toured Palestine. He found the Jewish immigrants passionate for music but there was little culture. However, this was soon to change and that change was to be led by Huberman.

Huberman was stirred to action by the rise to power of Adolf Hitler in Germany, in 1933. Hitler initiated his anti-Semitic views by firing Jewish artists, teachers and performers from the cultural institutions in Germany. This meant that thousands of Jewish musicians were out of work. Many with money and foresight left Europe. While others in the Jewish community felt that they could wait the situation out and that the hatred towards them would pass, Huberman understood what was going to happen in Germany and likely all over Europe.

As a result, Huberman cancelled all his concerts in Germany. In 1934, Joseph Goebels, Minister of Nazi Propaganda enacted a law allowing musicians to play in orchestras regardless of their race. Wilhelm Furtwangler who was conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic asked Huberman to reconsider but he declined as a way of protesting the Nazi regime. By 1935, every Jewish musician in the philharmonic was gone. Huberman left Germany and moved to Vienna, Austria. He stated: "I am a Jew, a Pole, a Pan-European and by each of these characteristics I am a dead enemy of Nazism."

Although Vienna was now his home, Huberman was stunned by the indifference of the Viennese when the Jews were attacked during anti-Semitic violence. Huberman realized that with many fine musicians being fired from world class orchestras, this would be the opportunity to bring them to Palestine to form a new orchestra that would bring culture to a people who hungered for it.

In 1936, the most famous musician in the world, Arturo Toscanini refused to perform in Germany and adamantly refused even a personal invitation from Adolf Hitler. When Huberman learned of this, he met Toscanini who volunteered to conduct the opening concerts of the new orchestra in Palestine. It would be an orchestra composed of exiles.

Huberman through his remarkable foresight, knew that Nazism would spread throughout Europe and so he set began to select the best musicians from European countries. He held auditions and selected the best. The Warsaw Symphony was forty percent Jewish and Huberman knew most of them so he decided to hold blind auditions.

As it would turn out, Huberman's predictions proved correct and Nazism spread throughout Europe. Those who were recruited and emigrated to Palestine were saved. Those who were not, disappeared into the Holocaust never to be seen again. Huberman was responsible for saving the lives of almost one thousand Jews. Interestingly the documentary reveals two musicians who left Palestine after being recruited and who returned to Europe only to die in concentration camps.

Orchestra of Exiles dramatizes Bronislaw Huberman's life through realistic re-enactments. Aronson also portrays, through interviews with the descendants of some of the orchestra's founding musicians, the difficulties Huberman encountered as he worked to select musicians, obtain visas for them, permits to enter Palestine and transportation to their new home. For many it was to be a life or death situation. The documentary also explores the situation in Palestine in the mid 1930's, as strife between the Arab and Jewish nations escalated. There are many interviews with renowned Jewish musicians including Itzhak Perlman, Pinchas Zukerman and Zubin Mehta. There is also an interesting story involved Huberman's violin and Joshua Bell.

Orchestra of Exiles came out of the suggestion by a friend of Aronson's, Dorit Grunschlag Straus, whose father, David Grunschlag was chosen by Bronislaw Huberman to travel to Palestine as part of the new orchestra. Grunschlag emigrated along with his parents and two sisters, thus saving them from the horrors of the Holocaust. This documentary is well worth watching and tells a remarkable story about an incredible musician who put his career on hold to fight for what he believed in and to save an important part of his culture.

Image credit: https://www.gramilano.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Bronislaw-Huberman-2.jpg

The Light In The Ruins by Chris Bohjalian

The Light in the Ruins is a historical mystery murder set in postwar Italy. The novel opens with the brutal and gruesome murder of Francesca Rosati in her apartment house in Florence. The novel contains three narratives, the first in italics is that of the killer, the second set in the past in 1943 during World War II, and the third in the present year of 1955 in postwar Italy.

The Murderer

The first narrative, set in italics is that of the murderer who describes in graphic detail how he murdered and dismembered Francesca Rosati. Thirty-nine-year-old Francesca's murder is committed during the early morning hours of the first Tuesday of June, 1955. The killer is able to easily break into her apartment building in a working class neighborhood in Florence on the Via Zara - a place he notes she would not have known existed, ten years ago. He then lies to get into her third floor apartment and kills her quickly but also removes her heart and places it on her vanity. His next victim will be the marchesa,  Francesca's mother, Beatrice Rosati.

As the details about Francesca's past come to light in the newspapers, the killer indicates that he plans to kill every surviving member of the Rosati family. Since Francesca's husband, Marco and their children Massimo and Alessia are dead as well as Antonio, this leaves Beatrice, Cristina, Vittore, his wife Guila and their two children Tatiana and Elisabetta. Cristina will be murdered last.

Shortly after the murder of Francesca, the killer murders the sixty-four-year=old marchesa, Beatrice Rosati in the hallway of the hotel she's staying at , slitting her throat and dragging her back to her hotel room. After Beatrice is murdered, he eviscerates her as he did with Francesca, removing her heart and placing it in a box atop a corner of the Florentine bridge that is in a painting. The killer then lays out how he now plans to kill the remaining Rosatis. Vittore's wife Giulia and their two girls, will be killed first, then he will kill Vittore and finally Cristina. The killer reveals that he plans to murder every surviving member of the Rosati family and that he has waited years to accomplish this.  He is patient, waiting for the right time just as he had to for Beatrice's murder. With each murder, he plans to cut out the heart of his victim and do something significant with it, as a sort of hint to the motive. 

1943-1944

At the beginning of the 1943 narrative, eighteen-year-old Cristina Rosati is watching planes as they fly over the Tuscan countryside. Cristina's brother Marco who is an engineer, is in Sicily making preparations for the expected Allied invasion, while her other brother twenty-six-year-old Vittore who is an archeologist, is safe in Florence. Cristina lives with her mother and father, Beatrice and Antonio, the marchesa and marchese of the Villa Chimera which is set in the Tuscan countryside, southeast of Siena. The family estate, Villa Chimera, overlooks Monte Volta and the vineyards and olive gardens. Also living in the villa is Cristina's sister-in-law, Francesca who is married to thirty-year-old Marco, as well as Francesca's two children, seven-year-old Massimo and five year-old Alessia. It is an afternoon in May and Francesca has just put the two children down for a nap. The planes are scaring Massimo who has overhead conversations about the war.

Cristina and her family are visited by an Italian, Major Giancarlo Lorenzetti and a German, Colonel Erhard Decher. Their appearance makes Cristina anxious but it turns out that they want to see the Etruscan tombs on the property. The ruins were discovered in 1937 and after an archeological dig, the artifacts of value including urns and sarcophogi were sent to the museum in Arezzo. Lorenzetti is an art historian who is hosting Colonel Decher. He tells Cristina that Decher has come to the Uffizi and has stated that "select artistic treasures may have to be moved to Germany for safeguarding until the end of the war." The Germans seem interested in Eruscan artifacts. Cristina realizes that since the war is going badly with the likelihood that Italy will be invaded by the Allies, the Germans are now interested in the theft of Italian artifacts. Decher was an architect before the war but he knows little about Etruscan history.

Vittore meets twenty-three-year-old Frederich Strekker, Decher's adjutant. Strekker is from Kesselsdorf, located outside of Dresden and his father is the curator of the musem there. Strekker tells Vittore that he loves Italy and that he served in Russia where he lost the lower part of his right leg. He is a well decorated soldier who has served in Greece, France and Ukraine. During a meeting one evening, Vittore tells Lorenzetti and Decher that all the artifacts from the Etruscan tombs are now in the museum in Arezzo. Decher informs Vittore that Herbert Kappler who is the SS liason to Mussolini is interested in the Etruscan artifacts. Vittore knows that a certain faction of the SS, the Ahnenerbe "is obsessed about ancestral German heritage." This is confirmed by Decher who tells him that the Reichsfuhrer, Himmler, is interested in the origins of race and believes there were Germanic tribes in this area of Italy long ago.

Meanwhile in Sicily, Captain Marco Rosati learns that the entire Italian First Army has surrendered and the battle at Tunis has been lost. His engineer, Moretti tells him that they will be next. Marco knows that laying mines on the beach will only delay the inevitable. The Allies will take Sicily and then move on to Italy.

Vittore, Lorenzetti and Decher along with Decher's adjutant, twenty-three-year-old Frederich Strekker leave Uffizi, the museum in Florence to travel to Arezzo. There they will be meeting up with the Rosati family  On the drive through Arezzo to the museum there, Cristina is shocked at the random destruction of parts of the city and the large number of corpses out in the open.  At the meeting with the Nazis, Cristina is captivated by Frederich Strekker and invites him to join her family at a restaurant while Vittore, Lorenzetti and Decher investigate the artifacts.

Frederich arranges to visit Villa Chimera after visiting Siena to poach a Simone Martini painting, on the pretext of viewing the Etruscan tombs. Frederich tells Cristina that he hopes the war will not come to Italy and that it will not be destroyed in the same way Russia was. Meanwhile the Ertuscan tombs become of great interest to the Germans, who want some of the relics to go to Rome and some to Germany while the Italians want them to stay in Tuscany. Cristina and Frederich share a mutual attraction and become romantically involved. Cristina's mother tells her that Frederich is a German and a Nazi who likely hates Jews and Russians.  

As Allies capture Sicily and begin invading Italy, life for the Rosati family becomes more challenging as their villa is commandeered by the Germans. Marco is now used as slave labour, repairing roads and railway tracks bombed by the Allies. But after five months, the German guards were lax and it was easy for him to slip away when he was southwest of Mount Amiata and walk to the Villa Chimera. There he was certain to find his wife and his beloved children. And he does but it isn't long before a group of partisans show up. They had been fighting in Trequanda and now have a badly injured teen girl who has been burned. It is the appearance of the partisans that will change life forever for the Rosati family.

1955

In the present, 1955, Serafina Bettini is the only woman investigator in the homicide unit in Florence. forty-eight-year-old Chief Inspector Paolo Ficino doesn't want to take Serafina to the Rosati crime scene because it is so grisly. However given her past he decides she can probably handle it. Serafina was a member of the partisans fighting against both the Nazis and the fascists in Italy. Her two brothers were murdered and with their deaths, having no other family, Serafina joined. 

In a battle between the retreating Nazi's and the partisans in Monte Volta, Serafina was badly injured by an incendiary grenade, her back, neck and arm burned. She remembers nothing of the time immediately afterwards, except that she was cared for a  nearby villa, but she's certain that is was not the Villa Chimera. 

Cristina tells Serafina that although she now lives in Rome with her mother, they have a villa in Monte Volta but no one lives there. She tells the police detective that the villa, which they called Villa Chimera had an olive grove, a small vineyard, cattle and a few horses. Serafina can't quite remember but she recalls that her partisan band had hidden from the Nazis in 1944. She remebers being wounded in "a brutal firefight at that beautiful villa near Monte Volta" as they tried to hold up the Germans so the British or the Americans could catch up and engage them. However, the Germans put up more fight than expected and her band had to fall back to villa. Now Serafina wonders if maybe "this woman's family had in fact been German sympathizers-- supporters of Mussolini--even as late as 1944..." Serafina remembers that there were many partisan groups in Tuscany as they all fought to defeat the hated Nazis and those who supported them. She learns from Cristina that Francesca's husband Marco is deceased as are their two children. Cristina tells her that they did not know the Germans had mined the estate and that is how Francesca's children died.

Serafina lives in a two-bedroom apartment on the south side of the Arno River with her roommate, an American banker named Milton and his gay lover who is a purser on the SS Cristoforo Columbo. Milton is her best friend but people believe he is her lover. Serafina doesn't know how her family would feel about her unusual living arrangements as she has no living family. They were all murdered when she was much younger.

After interviewing the tenants in Francesca's building Serafina is told by a widow that Francesca had seen someone she recognized and who frightened her and she asked the widow for the name of a locksmith. Interviewing Isabella, Francesca's boss at the dress shop, The Sunflower, Serafina learns that Francesca saw many men and that she was going to dinner with a lawyer from Bologna at the very elegant Il Latini. That man, Mario Spagnoli returns to Florence to tell the police what he knows about Francesca's last night. The coroner, Alberto Carli explains how Francesca's heart was removed from her chest - by someone using the tools of a surgeon.

Paolo interviews Beatrice who is also with her daughter, Cristina. They tell Paolo that Francesco was not well liked as she was opinionated and direct, that she was angry and judgemental after the deaths of Marco and her children. Beatrice had not seen her since Christmas of  1950. Cristina is not so convinced that Mario Spagnoli is innocent since his alibi is not convincing. That night at dinner with Milton, Serafina wonders if Francesca's murder is somehow connected to the war. Her own memories of what happened near Monte Volta are vague: she only remembers being treated for the horrific burns on her scalp and down the right side of her back. In questioning Cristina, Serafina learns that there were three men who worked with Vittore at the museum; an Italian, Major Giancarlo Lorenzetti and a German, Colonel Erhard Decher. Cristina omits the name of Frederich Strekker but states that they had been coming to the villa for a year - since 1943. Paolo is puzzled as to why someone would wait eleven years to kill Francesca, unless perhaps they were in jail. After visiting Monte Volta and talking to people who knew the Rosatis including a young man who worked on the estate, Serafina learns that Cristina was involved with a German soldier, Frederich Strekker. It also appeared to the people in the village that the Rosati's were collaborators with the Nazis. This leads Serafina to suspect that Cristina may now be in danger.

However, as she's leaving Monte Volta, the smell of mushrooms at a restaurant makes Serafina remember that this smell was what she encountered earlier in the day at the Etruscan tomb on the Rosati's villa. She returns to the tombs but it is not the mushroom smell but the images on the walls of the tombs that bring back her memory: it was in the tombs, after the British had taken Monte Volta that she was hidden and treated for her terrible burns.

As Serafina investigates Francesca's murder, and then Beatrice's murder, it becomes clear that someone is targeting the Rosati family. As she interviews Cristina and the neighbours in Francesca's apartment house, she becomes convinced that the key to the murders lies in the past, in something that happened during the latter part of the war. With her own memories of what happened to her on Monte Volta during the German retreat mostly lost, Seraphina begins to wonder what really happened at the Villa Chimera eleven years ago.

Discussion

Chris Bohjalian has crafted a masterful piece of historical fiction that weaves three narratives together, incorporating two timelines that of 1943 and World War II in Italy, and the postwar period in 1955. These narratives, at first seemingly loosely connected become interwoven into the revealing climax. Readers should be advised that this is a very gruesome novel with some very graphic descriptions of murder and corpses.

The three narratives are masterfully woven to a suspenseful reveal and a satisfying ending. Both the narrative of the killer and the 1955 timeline occur over the span of several days, while the timeline of the past describes the events during the years 1943 and 1944.

The killer gives clues throughout their narrative that they know the area around Florence very well. It seems they might know the family well, at least they do know who of the Rosati family survived the war. These are not random murders. The murderer knows the tragedies the family experienced in 1944, that Francesca struggled with depression. They state that Beatrice Rosati was not named for Dante's muse, Bice de Folco Portinari but after her aunt who lived in Pienza. It's been eleven years since the fall of Italy which suggests that for one reason or another the killer has not been able to exact their revenge until now. As Paolo suggests, this person may have been in jail.

The 1943-1944 narrative presents the tragic story of the Rosati family during the latter part of the Nazi occupation of Italy and during the invasion by the Allies. The Rosati villa was once a thriving estate, but by 1943, most of the cattle have been confiscated by the government. The appearance of the Nazis at the Rosati villa is not welcomed by Antonio or Beatrice or their daughter-in-law, Francesca who is disgusted at the Germans. Soon more groups of Italian and German officers visit Villa Chimera to see the Etruscan tombs, believing they hold a clue to early Germanic and therefore Aryan history. By this time, against the advice of Francesca, Cristina has become romantically involved with a Nazi officer Frederich Strekker whom she doesn't consider to be like the other Nazis. Francesca warns her that he is no different from the others - he is a Nazi. In November 1943, as the battle up the boot of Italy rages, Francesca prophesies,  "My family, .. is commingling with the cowardly angels. We will pay. We will all pay."  By 1944, the grounds of the Villa Chimera are mostly destroyed, its grape arbors gone. The villa had been home to the tents, jeeps and guns of the Nazis who are now leaving with the British and Americans on their heels.  

When the partisan's arrive, with a very seriously injured girl, Beatrice immediately works to help her. Enrico, the leader of the partisans confronts Antonio who tells him that he had no choice but to work with the Nazis, and that the last few weeks they have been prisoners, stating that he is no blackshirt. However, the unexpected return of the Nazis and their discovery of a British rifle used by the partisans leads to catastrophe for the Rosati family.  Believing Marco is a partisan, they torture him, beat Antonia and learn that the partisans are hiding in the tombs. This sets in motion  a series of tragic events on the villa that ripple down eleven years later to 1955.

In the present, 1955, as Serafina investigates the murders of Francesca and Beatrice she comes to believe that their murders are somehow connected to the war years. Initially Serafina doesn't believe she was near Monte Volta when she was terribly injured. However, Serafina gradually regains her memories of those fateful days when she was badly burned by an incendiary grenade when she visits Villa Chimera. She remembers being inside the Etruscan tombs where she was ministered to and has vague memories of the paintings on the tomb walls. These memories are confirmed during an interview with Cristina and Vittore who tell her that initially she was taken to the kitchen of the villa. There Beatrice brought the last of the villa's olive oil and Francesca's face cream to help treat Serafina's burns. The Germans were fighting near the villa and then returned to the villa with the British in pursuit. The marchese and marchesa had Cristina take Serafina and the partisans to hide in the tombs. The Rosatis want the partisans to leave but the leaders of the partisans, Enrico and his wife Teresa believe the injured girl will not survive being moved and so they hide in the tombs. Only Serafina and Enrico will survive.

Bohjalian weaves each of the narratives to its inevitable conclusion; the 1943/1944 narrative reveals what really happened in the closing days of the Italian campaign, as the Germans retreated through Italy, pillaging and murdering, sparing neither the Rosati family nor their beloved villa. The 1955 narrative reveals both the connection to the 1943 narrative and the identity of the killer.

The author effectively captures the moral dilemmas people often encounter during war. This is done through several characters,  including Antonio, Francesca, and Cristina.  Antonio knew what the Nazis were but he cooperated in the hopes that he could protect his family and his villa. By 1944, with his villa in ruins, he regrets his choices and he is filled with self-loathing and wonders what he has done. " He had let this one soldier into his daughter's life. Then he had allied himself with the men his second son worked with in Florence. And suddenly he had found himself giving a personal tour of the Etruscan tombs to the Gestapo chief in Rome...Herbert Kappler. He had come to Monte Volta with an entourage that filled three staff cars. He'd spent the night in the guest room overlooking the swimming pool. Dined with the marchese's family on the small plenty that remained at the Villa Chimera, while SS troopers stood guard outside the villa..."  In some respects it appears Antonio is in denial. Herbert Kappler, Head of the Gestapo in Rome during the war, would likely have been well known to Antonio, Beatrice and Vittore. He was responsible for the deportation of Italian Jews to Auschwitz and later on for massacre of three hundred thirty-five Italians in the Ardeatine Caves. And Antonia held a ball in April for the Germans and Italians who worked at the Uffizzi. Even his son, Vittore saw that this was wrong and refused to attend. Although he tells Enrico Tarantolo, a partisan, he's no Blackshirt, it's not surprising that to the villagers, Antonio would have been considered a collaborator.  In the end Antonio finds that it did not save his villa or his family; attempting to appease evil never succeeds. 

Francesca also dislikes the Nazis and knows they are evil. She advises her sister-in-law, Cristina against becoming involved with a Nazi officer. When Marco is accused of being a partisan after the discovery of the British rifle at the villa and is tortured, it is Francesca who reveals where the partisans are hiding in the hopes of saving her beloved husband.  "Deranged by terror and loss and simple exhaustion, the abyssal descent into compromise, she found herself murmuring the answer in her head and trying to understand what would happen if she said the words aloud. In her mind's eye, she saw the captain pulling down his gun. Ordering his men to the tombs. And then...

Then what? Would Muller bother to ask her or her parents why the partisans were here on their property? And if he did ask, would he listen when one of them explained that the partisans had arrived the night before and there was nothing -- nothing at all -- the family could have done? " 

In desperation, Francesca reveals the partisan's hiding place but it does not save Marco. In an act of unspeakable cruelty, Captain Mullers brutally murders Marco in front of Francesca and their two young children. Her attempt to save her husband and her children results in the deaths of the partisans. The trauma of these events lead Francesca to a life of promiscuity as a way to cope. It is clear she is drowning in self-loathing, grief and pain. And sadly her betrayal of the partisans lead years later, to her own brutal murder and that of her mother-in-law. She is a truly tragic figure in the novel and demonstrate how compromise and capitulation can play out in war.

Cristina seems to have few reservations about her relationship with a Nazi officer during the war. She is young and her attraction to the young Frederich Strekker leads to a relationship that labels her in the village. Her actions so offend her brother Vitorre that he brawls with Frederich in Florence and confronts her. "Cristina, don't you see what the Germans are? They are even worse than our Fascists!... They are taking over the country, they're stealing our art. They hate us -- they hate everyone who isn't one of them! Who knows what they're really doing to the Jews, who knows what...."  But Cristina is convinced that Frederich isn't a part of that. Vittore tells Cristina that he and Marco do not have a choice but are forced to work with the Germans, while she has made the choice to associate with a Nazi. But Cristina isn't willing to consider that what she is doing is "collaborating". It seems that Cristina has suffered little consequences as a result of her actions during the war. There is no mention of any public shaming, although she had been living with her mother Beatrice and had not married. Although she never knew his fate after the war, Cristina never gave up hope that somehow he survived the war. 

Two German characters, Captain Oskar Muller and Colonel Erhard Decher portray the brutality of the Nazis. Muller brutally tortures and eventually kills Marco Rosati in front of his wife and children because Marco refused to reveal that the partisans are hidden on the villa grounds. Colonel Decher is similarily cruel and depraved: he orders the massacre of the villagers and their priest as a reprisal, having them bayoneted and then their bodies blown up. Hoping to escape responsibility for this war crime, he steals the dead Frederich Strekker's dog tags, replacing them with his own and his pay book so that the body will be identified as his. However, it is later revealed that Decher meets his end in a most fitting way in Budapest, although his body is identified as Strekker's.

The heroine of the novel is Serafina Bettini. Serafina's parents were murdered because her father was assistant to Dino Grandi who had led the failed coup against Mussolini in July 1943. Grandi was a Blackshirt and a supporter of Benito Mussolini but he did not support Italy's racial laws nor its involvment in World War II. Chairman of the Grand Council of Fascism, Grandi was able to engineer a vote that desposed Mussolini but soon after he escaped to Spain. It was after this that Serafina's parents were murdered by the Nazis. Serafina and her brothers fled north from Rome and ended up with the partisans. For five months they stayed with them but Serafina became separated from her brothers when the Nazis began search the area around Mount Amiata. She survived by hiding with two men in a shed on a tenant farm but her brothers did not. Serafina believes the villa they were on was near Trequanda. 

After joining up with the partisans, Serafina was badly burned during a battle and taken to the Villa Chimera. Against all odds she survived, badly scarred on her right side of her head, neck and back. Serafina is unable to raise her arm above her head. In the post-war she changed her name to Serafina and was able to be hired on by the Florence police. She lives with Milton, a gay man who treats her with tenderness. It is also obvious that Seraphina is traumatized by her war experience, as she frequently self-harms. Although her partner,  It is Seraphina who quickly and astutely begins to consider that the murders of the Rosati women might somehow be related to the war. Eventually she confronts the killer, almost losing her life in the process.

The Light In the Ruins is a masterful piece of fiction that especially portrays the brutality of war on a personal level. This novel had its genesis after Chris Bohjalian read Iris Origo's memoir, War in Val d'Orcia which describes life in Tuscany during the Allied invasion of the Italian mainland. While the village of Monte Volta is fictional, as are many of the characters, some like Herbert Kappler (who was famously challenged by Monsignor Hugh O'Flaherty), and Dino Grandi are not. 

Well-written, suspenseful, fans of Chris Bohjalian will enjoy this historical mystery.

Book Details:
The Light In The Ruins by Chris Bohjalian
New York: Doubleday Publishers    2013
320 pp.

The Milk of Birds by Sylvia Whitman

"Peace is the milk of birds."

This novel is a truly heartrending fictional account of the terrible situation endured by the people of Darfur, especially its women in 2008.
 
Milk of Birds contains two narratives, that of Nawra bint Ibrahim, a fourteen year old girl in a refugee camp in Darfur and Katherine (K.C.) Cannelli, a young girl struggling academically in her first year of high school. Their stories are told in a series of letters exchanged between the two girls, which highlight their profoundly different life experiences and culture. Each girl also has her own story which informs the reader of the reality of their lives.

K.C. lives in Richmond, Virginia with her mother and older brother, Todd. Her father and mother are divorced and he has remarried. She is still trying to come to terms with what has happened to their family.

K.C is having difficulty in school. Her marks are poor and she has trouble concentrating. Her mother signs her up to be a part of the Save the Girls nonprofit organization working with refugees from Darfur, Sudan. They send a donation each month, part of which goes to the girl in a refugee camp who then sends letters back to her sponsor. Save the Girls matches a girl refugee with a sister in America so they can correspond. 

K.C. is matched with Nawra bint Ibrahim who is living in a refugee camp in Darfur. The two girls are to correspond, but K.C. gets four letters from Nawra which she doesn't respond to. K.C. doesn't respond, mainly because she has difficulty writing but also because of a kind of indifference. ...Life sucks for this Nawra person.  But what am I supposed to do about it? I can't even pass the practice test in world geography."  K.C. reveals to Nawra  that she is the oldest in her class and was held back in school when she was younger. While Nawra isn't able to go to school, K.C. wishes she didn't have to. School is hard for her and it seems to take her a long time to finish assignments. Finally her mother decides to get K.C. tested to see if she has a learning problem.

As K.C. continues to write to Nawra and receives her letters, she begins to understand just how difficult Nawra's life is and she wants to do something. Contact with Nawra expands her world, shows her that people everywhere have problems and helps put her own problems in perspective.

Eventually KC decides that she wants to form a new club at her school, The Darfur Club, to educate people on the situation in Sudan and to raise money to buy fuel-efficient stoves and donkeys. For K.C. it's about making a difference. With Mr. Nguyen as their faculty sponsor, K.C. and her best friend, Emily and her classmate Parker (whom she is crushing on) organize a major project to raise money for the refugees, to buy them things that will make their lives easier and help them get a new start. This project highlights one of K.C.'s strengths - that of thinking outside the box.

In complete contrast to K.C's life of physical ease and comfort, is Nawra's struggle to live with even a bit of dignity in a world torn apart by war, greed and fear. Nawra lives in a camp for displaced refugees (Internally Displaced Persons - IDP) after fleeing from the janjaweeds (outlaws hired by the Sudanese government) who murdered everyone in her village, Umm Jamila. Only Nawra and her mother, who is in such shock she is mute, have escaped. Nawra finds herself pregnant as a result of rape, dishonored and like "spoiled meat". The camp is crowded, dirty and smelly. There is little food and poor sanitation. Still the refugees know that life must go on and a school is formed for the children.  There she meets a young girl, Adeeba  from a well to do family, who is educated, but also now a refugee. Together the two girls help one another.  "When a tree leans, it will rest on its sister." 

When the Save the Girls representatives show up, Nawra is encouraged to join, so she can have some extra money. Nawra who cannot write, dictates her letters to Adeeba, who acts as a scribe.  As we read the two girls' correspondence, it becomes apparent that despite the cultural divide and the geographic distance, both K.C. and Nawra have some similar problems.

Like K.C., Nawra's family is"broken", but not by choice, but by violence and murder. For K.C. she understands how Nawra feels "spoiled" or as K.C. puts it, "defective"  with her inability to do school work. Like K.C., Nawra also has difficulty writing but it is because she is illiterate. Despite the huge cultural differences as evidenced by what each girl writes about, both girls can find something in their letters that resonates with them. Nawra encourages K.C. to persevere and to respect her mother, while K.C. is deeply touched by Nawra's struggle to simply survive and she encourages her to keep going. Both girls stories end with a measure of hope and both begin to find their own way in their world.

Discussion  

The Milk of  Birds  begins slowly but Whitman is simply setting the stage. Readers are encouraged to persevere because there is an important story to be told and it is worth reading. Whitman did a great deal of research in order to create Nawra's voice and make it authentic. She also educates her readers through Nawra's narrative but also by using K.C.'s mom, who gives her daughter some background information on how things came to be in Sudan.

Nawra is from Dafur which is located in southern Sudan. At the time of the events in the novel, Sudan was divided into two regions: the north which is predominantly Muslim and the south with a Christian and animist population. Civil war resulted when the Sudanese government based in Khartoum in northern Sudan, led by General Omar al-Bashir decided to impose a Muslim state on the mainly Christian southern region. 

The predominantly Muslim Darfur region is characterized by two ethnic cultural groups: ethnic Africans who live a pastoral life and Arabs who are nomadic herders. Armed militia groups of ethnic Arabs who came to be known as "Janjaweed" would follow up after government attacks, burning villages and systematically raping women. This genocide resulted in at least four hundred thousand deaths. The purpose of the genocide was to rid Darfur of Black and non-Arab people. The ongoing war has resulted in thousands of people who have been displaced by the war, forced into refugee camps. In 2011, Southern Sudan became a new country.  The Milk of Birds is set against this backdrop of war, genocide and trauma.

There are many issues explored in this novel including rape, female circumcision, AIDS, forced marriage, the concept of honor in Sudanese Muslim families, the role of men and women, identity, education for girls, learning disabilities, environmental destruction, and global social responsibility. While that might seem like far too many, really all these issues at inter-related, especially in the African state of Sudan, and in Nawra's culture. And the this issues are often only obliquely mentioned but yet they are interconnected.

For example, the issue of AIDS and rape are related, not just because a woman can contract AIDS from rape, but also because of the belief by the men in Nawra's culture that sex with a virgin can cure them. Although there is only a mention of this in passing in the novel, this is a prevalent belief that medical field workers must counter. It leads to the violation of very young girls. Rape is also often used as a weapon of war, to destroy a society, weakening family bonds, and demoralizing and marginalizing women.

Although there is quite a bit of violence in the novel it's not done in a graphic way, but told simply using Nawra's understated narrative. The beautiful cover only enhances the prospective reader's desire to open the cover and learn more. 

Book Details:
The Milk of Birds by Sylvia Whitman
Toronto: Atheneum Books for Young Readers    2013
363 pp.

A Soldier's Secret by Marissa Moss

Marissa Moss has written a captivating account of the true story of Sarah Emma Edmonds, a Canadian girl who served in the Union Army during the American Civil War. Moss's account is well researched

Sarah Edmonds fled her home in New Brunswick, Canada when her father, an abusive man, arranged the forced marriage of Sarah to a much older farmer. Sarah did much of the work on her father's farm, as her brother was weak and sickly, with the expectation that someday she would take over the farm. However, when she saw the life she as being sold into, Sarah fled. The circumstances that led to her running away are told in a flashback later on in the novel.

At first she did odd jobs but when she arrived in Hartford, Connecticut she was able to get work as a Bible salesman for a book seller by the name of Mr. Hurlbut. When the war starts, Sarah who now goes by the name of Frank Thompson enlists and becomes Private Frank Thompson in Company F, Second Michigan Volunteer Infantry of the Army of the Potomac.

Frank is assigned a tent with Damon Stewart and together the two of them train in city of Washington. Sarah has lived as a man for three years prior to enlisting but being in the army proves to be more challenging because she will be living with men in close quarters. However, Frank manages to hide her feminine attributes by binding her breasts and making sure she is not seen relieving herself or changing her clothing. She makes sure she belches and passes wind, scratches her crotch and tells ribald jokes, all to make herself appear more masculine.

Frank and Damon, as part of the Army of the Potomac march to Centreville, Va to meet the Confederate Army in what will be the first battle of the Civil War. They join General Samuel P. Heintzelman's Third Division and fight in the first Battle of Bull Run which turns out to be a rout by the Confederates. For Frank Thompson it is a terrible initiation into war, as thousands of Union soldiers are killed or wounded. Frank works as a nurse, assisting doctors in the hundreds of amputations, treating patients with dysentery and comforting the dying.

Sarah Edmonds as Frank Thompson

In a field hospital at Washington, Frank meets Jerome Robbins from Matherton, Michigan. They soon form a friendship that for Frank develops into a blossoming friendship and then unrequited love. But when Jerome asks his sweetheart in a letter to marry him, Frank confesses to Jerome her secret identity and her love for him. Jerome is horrified and disbelieving. Frank expects him to turn her in, but Jerome doesn't and keeps Frank's secret. Through the next few years, Sarah in her role as Frank Thompson struggles with her love for Jerome, knowing he will never love her and that he is not attracted to her in any way. She is careful not to touch him or to share her feelings with him again.

Frank has many adventures while a soldier, working as a nurse, a mail carrier, an orderly carrying messages during battles and also as a spy. As Frank Thompson, she also takes part in battles and carries out her duties with great courage. During the Virginia Peninsula campaigns in the Virginia swamps, Frank contracts "swamp fever" or malaria which eventually grows worse over time causes her to desert the army to get treated.

Discussion

It was amazing to read how resourceful and intelligent Sarah was as she remained undiscovered as a woman soldier for several years. It was only when she fell desperately ill with malaria that she had to relinquish her identity as a man and live again as a woman. Her love of horses and skill as a horseman, her master of disguises, and her quick thinking make her an endearing hero(ine). What was interesting was Sarah's view of being a woman in 19th century America. She found everything about the role of women in society to be stifling. She wanted adventure and the freedom to choose her life, the man she would marry, and even what to wear. To live the way she wanted,  cost her dearly as it meant giving up her family and sometimes led to her feeling very lonely. She saw the men of the army as her true brothers and her family and she resolved to help them after the war was over.

Moss has written a very informative account from the perspective of  Frank Thompson that gives the reader a great sense of what it was like as a soldier during the Civil War. Moss portrays the horror of the battles, how the soldiers viewed the war and why they were fighting, how battles were fought, and the roles of men and women in 19th century America.

Sarah Edmonds as a woman.

The back of the novel contains a section entitled The Story behind The Story which  tells about Sarah Emma Edmonds and what happened to Sarah after she left the army. Moss used Jerome Robbin's diary as well as letters and journals of other soldiers who served with Frank Thompson to recreate this incredible story.  Unbelievably, there were over 400 women who dressed as men to fight in the Civil War. Most of these were following relatives or husbands into the war. Sarah Emma Edmonds also published her own memoir in 1864 titled, Unsexed, or the Female Soldier.

There is also a section on Union Army Officer Biographies and a Civil War Timeline, and a Selected Bibliography.

Fans of historical fiction will truly enjoy this well written and researched novel.

You can read a good summary of Sarah Edmonds' life at the Civil War Trust website:https://www.battlefields.org/learn/biographies/sarah-emma-edmonds

Image credits:
Sarah Edmonds as Frank Thompson: 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Emma_Edmonds#/media/File:Sarah_Edmonds.jpg

Sarah Edmonds as a woman:  https://www.nps.gov/people/sarah-emma-edmonds.htm

Book Details:

A Soldier's Secret: The Incredible True Story of Sarah Edmonds, A Civil War Hero by Marissa Moss
New York: Amulet Books     2012
387 pp.