Driving By Starlight by Anat Deracine

Driving By Starlight is Anat Deracine's debut novel about two Muslim teenage girls who live in Saudi Arabia and their struggle to balance their dreams and hopes with the restrictive society they live in while maintaining their friendships.

Leena Hadi lives with her mother Norah in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Her father  is in jail for having protested against the government. Leena longs to make her own choices, to go to school and have a career. She has a reputation for breaking the rules and therefore has the nickname, "Leena Adhaleena which meant Leena who goes astray." Her best friend is Mishail, Quraysh whose father is minister of the interior in the Saudi government. Before her father was arrested, Leena and Mishail's fathers were good friends.

The two girls who are seniors at Nizamiyyah Secondary  are planning an act of defiance of Saudi Arabia's strict dress code for women when their class travels to a park. They don't want a class picture of three rows of girls in black abayas, with only their eyes showing. Instead they plan to take a picture of themselves wearing beautiful colourful dresses in the park. Since all women's cellphone cameras are smashed at the time of purchase, Mishail brings a pocket camera belonging to her brother.The seniors include Aisha, Bilquis, Mishail, Sofia and Leena. They wait for their supervising teacher to fall asleep and then race to the bathrooms to change into Western-style clothes. However, Bilquis decides to tell the headmistress what they are doing.

When they return to the school, Maryam Madam speaks to Aisha, Mishail, Sofia and Leena attempting to find out who is responsible. Getting nothing out of them, she talks to Leena alone who confesses to what happened. Before Leena's father's arrest, Maryam Madam had promised to take care of her.Now she allows her to make prints of the photos before destroying the digital files. Leena tells her that she is considering Princess Nora  University for law, but Maryam Madam tells her that this may be difficult due to her father's situation.

Because her father is absent, Leena must dress as a man to accompany her mother shopping - a practice known as boyat. They walk to the home of her father's law partner, Hossein so her mother can get some papers signed. While there they learn from the television that riots have closed the only co-ed university in the country. After a period of protests by Islamic fanatics, the government makes some concessions including the exclusion of women from KASP scholarships. Schools reopen and when Leena returns to her school she finds that there are new students from Najd National, a school that has been destroyed. Now in addition to new students, Leena's school will also have the headmistress from Najd, Naseema Madam.

Leena's relationship with Mishail begins to unravel with the presence of a new girl, Daria Abulkhair. Daria is half American and lives in one of the American ARAMCO campuses. She knows how to drive a car and unlike her classmates has experience: she's French-kissed a boy. Daria also knows how to meet boys at Faisaliyah, a mall in Riyadh, something Mishail is determined to experience. Leena is horrified as this is a serious crime under Saudi law. Mishail reveals that her father wants to marry her off by the end of the year, even though she's only fifteen. She wants to find her own boy, to have another option. Leena reluctantly agrees to go to Faisaliyah.

Leena is further upset by the presence of Daria when the new girl is chosen over Leena for the debate team. Daria was chosen over Leena because of the situation with Leena's father.This will have a huge impact on Leena's future because it now means she will have no chance of qualifying for a scholarship. To apply to another university requires the signed permission of her father, something Leena will not be able to obtain.

As Daria and Mishail's friendship grows, Leena finds herself on the outside, growing jealous. At a party at Daria's home, Leena meets Ahmed who is Daria's cousin. Only a few years older than Leena her reveals that he attended her father's shillahs. Mishail becomes jealous after seeing Leena speaking with Ahmed, telling her friend that she has been seeing Ahmed and believes he loves her. The two girls argue and Leena afraid for her friend and at the urging of Daria, informs the headmistresses about what Mishail has been doing. This fractures the two girls friendship and Leena realizes that they have been played against one another by Daria. Mishail is replaced on the debate team by Aisha and suspended for two weeks.

Meanwhile Leena begins seeing Ahmed and his rebel friends almost every night in the desert, dressed as a boy, learning to drive. She comes to realize that she is doing the very thing she reported Mishail for. Despite this she doesn't care. At this time, knowing that she must look out for herself, she begins reading law cases with her father's partner, working for him whenever she can. At school, Daria's cruelty towards Aisha who doesn't understand the law she must debate very well, leads Leena to realize that they must stop fighting against one another and start helping each other.

Leena decides to form her own shillah with Aisha to stop the fighting. They write a contract for the secret society that will included the outcasts and "required that girls who joined had to share a secret that they had told no one else and had to give evidence of it..." They also had to help others in the shillah, promising to never knowingly harm them. As a start, Leena begins helping Aisha for the debate.Soon many of their classmates are interested in joining.

When Leena gets into trouble with the muttaween for walking alone at night, the truth about her father's political activism is revealed. With the help of her mother and Maryam Madam, and Leena's own knowledge of the law, a way is found to not only help her gain her independence and a say in her life but also to save her best friend's life and help the other young women in her shillah who also face the same challenges.

Discussion

Driving By Starlight is a novel set in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia  that explores the themes of friendship, family and freedom. The story is centered around the friendship between two girls, Leena and Mishail and their lives in a country with strict Islamic laws. Almost immediately readers get a sense of what life is like for girls and women in Saudi Arabia, a Muslim country whose laws and culture are centered on Sharia law. Every aspect of their lives is affected. Deracine peppers Leena's narrative with many descriptions of how restrictive her life is, demonstrating just how broken the country is.

Leena, is a brilliant student who wants to study law. However, her father's arrest has made this all but impossible because as a girl she requires the written permission of her father. The fact that she cannot make her own decisions without the permission of a man infuriates Leena. Throughout her narrative she notes the many restrictions and rules of Saudi life, as a result of Sharia law. For example, most people live attempting to not attract the attention of "the muttaween, the religious police from Al-Hai'a, the Committee for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice." who lurk everywhere, even on the roads. "Surveillance cameras were on every street corner, and muttaween in their vans pulled up alongside us to inspect the car's inhabitants..."

Women especially experience many restrictions that men do not. Leena notes that in order for her and her friends to take pictures they need to borrow a camera because their cell phones have no working cameras. This is because "all women's cell phone cameras were smashed at the time of purchase." Posting anything online is a dangerous affair due to Al-Hai'a who spy "on all phone and internet communications in the country. Not only did all our phones have apps that regularly pinged our guardians with our location, our fathers could always request the records to determine if there had been any inappropriate communications."

Contact between unrelated girls and boys is forbidden and the sexes are strictly segregated. "By law, the boys' school had to be at least five kilometers from ours to prevent the ever troublesome potential indecency." This segregation also exists in many homes. When Leena visits her friend and stays for dinner, the women eat separate from the men;  Mishail, her mother and Leena in the kitchen while Mishail's brothers and her father in the livingroom, "passing dishes through the barely open doorway." But Leena notes it wasn't always this way in the Quraysh family, only when Mishail's father become a minister.

Laws governing marriage strongly favour men, although Muslims are likely to view them as protecting women. Leena notes that while women must remain faithful men do not experience the same expectations. "When the law stated that a man could marry four women and have a few concubines besides through misyar marriages, a boy was not just well within his rights to love two girls, he was practically a saint for choosing only two."

Just how different a girl's life is from a boy is highlighted many times throughout the novel. Faraz, the son of Leena's father's law partner wonders why Leena, who is very smart, doesn't apply for university outside the country. But for a girl it's not so simple.  "So easy for men to just set out on their adventures, leave everyone else behind. Even if I could leave, even if every cell in my body ached for scholarships that I wouldn't get, what was I supposed to do, abandon Mishail and my mother? Give up on my father?" Leena cannot move about in public without a male guardian unless she practices boyat, dressing in a white thobe, pretending to be a boy. She is driven to her school every day by a man in a car. She cannot drive, not even to the hospital (although that was changed this summer). She needs the signature of her male guardian to apply for university. And as Leena bitterly notes, Quaraouine, a university founded by a woman, is now closed to her, allowing only men to study there.

Leena and her best friend Mishail find their friendship almost destroyed when they fall for the same boy and as they clash over rebelling against the strict rules of their culture. Leena attempts to warn her best friend but Mishail tells her, "I know it's dangerous...Everything we want is forbidden or dangerous. I just don't care." Soon Leena finds herself committing the same crimes but like Mishail, she doesn't care because she has no father to protect her and no future to save. She continues to meet Ahmed and his friends, partly because she loves driving in the dark as it gives her a sense of freedom that she longs for, "...nobody watching to tell us about the laws we were breaking." 

Deracine's heroine, is a strong, intelligent young woman who is not content to live her life dictated by men. Leena begins to take control of her life by studying with her father's law partner in the hopes that she can one day attend university. After seeing Daria being especially cruel to Aisha, Leena decides women must work together to help one another. "We were all fighting one another for a window out of hell. Me against my sisters. It had to stop." She cites the example of Manal Al-Sharif who organized a Facebook protest, asking women to drive in protest of the law forbidding women this right. Although half a million people watched the video, only a few dozen came out to support her. "Even other women called her a pot-stirrer, a troublemaker, someone who was setting back the reformers' negotiations with her impatience."  To that end, Leena forms a shillah or secret society.

The author foreshadows the future choice of temporary marriage that Leena, Aisha, Sofia and Mishail make in order to obtain some control over their lives. As Daria explains early on in the novel, "It's a way for single women to find a convenient guardian, or to, you know, do things, without waiting. Understand?" Although Leena is somewhat disgusted she realizes the temptation in signing a piece of paper in order to live in peace, to live one's life the way one chooses. Mishail believes people must do whatever they need to in order to survive, quoting her best friend, "Water will find a way."  And that is exactly what Leena, Misahil and Sofia discover as they are helped by Maryam Madam, Dr. Haider (Aisha's father), Mishail's father and Leena's mother to obtain a legal guardian, marry and leave the country. All of this demonstrates just how little freedom exists for women in Saudi Arabia outside of the conventional Muslim society and how much work remains to be done in the area of women's rights and the full participation of women in public life. But it also shows how people do work together to help women circumnavigate the strict rules of life in Saudi Arabia.

Anat Deracine is a pen name chosen by the author because it means "to uproot from one's native land"  reflecting  her experience as an immigrant, from Saudia Arabia to Canada and then to the United States. Deracine used her experiences growing up in Saudi Arabia to craft many of the scenes in her novel.

Driving By Starlight offers teen readers a window into a culture that is very different from their own in the West but its themes of the meaning of friendship and family are common to all cultures and to the challenging teen years. Although Deracine does include a Glossary at the back, there are many terms and concepts unique to a Muslim society that readers will not be familiar with and which perhaps should have been included in the Glossary and elaborated on in an Author's Note at the back. But overall, Deracine  portrays life in Saudi Arabia in a way that is real to her readers. Her characters are realistic, having both virtue and weaknesses. The beautiful cover will help to draw readers to read this well-written novel by this promising young author.

Book Details:

Driving By Starlight by Anat Deracine
New York: Henry Holt and Company      2018
277 pp.

That Burning Summer by Lydia Syson

That Burning Summer covers a series of fictional events during the summer of 1940, just as World War II is ramping up. Set in the Romney coast area of England the story opens in July just after Peggy Fisher, her younger brother Ernest and her mother have been forced to leave their home in Lydd near the coast and move to the farmhouse by Snargate where her mother grew up. The army has requisitioned their house so they have moved in with Uncle Fred, Aunt Myra and Cousin June and her baby daughter Claudette. The story is told from three points of view, that of Peggy, Ernest and Henryk.

Eleven-year-old Ernest is obsessed with the Leaflet that has been circulated by the Ministry of Information and the War Office about what to do if the German's invade. But Peggy is sick of hearing him talk about it and reminds him that "It says 'If the invader comes." Not 'When the invader comes.'" However, Ernest believes it's best to be prepared and can't understand Peggy's lack of interest.

Ernest ignores his sister's instructions to return home and instead rides his bike to the shore where he stands looking towards France. The instructions in the leaflet weigh heavily on his mind as he worries what he would do if the Germans invaded. He sees the coils of barbed wire along the shoreline and the low concrete buildings called blockhouses. As he's riding back towards home, Ernest hears a plane falling from the sky, on fire, black smoke trailing behind. The sight and sound of the plane causes him to crash his bike and lose his glasses so he thinks it has crashed into Walland Marsh. What he doesn't see is the pilot parachuting to the ground. When Ernest returns home to tell his family what he saw he is sent to the Land Defense Volunteers to make a report. The volunteers set out to where Ernest believes the plane went down and find evidence of the crashed plane but by this time it has sunk into the marsh and as everyone believes, along with the pilot too.

However it turns out that the pilot did survive. Polish airman, Henryk had just survived an encounter with German enemy fighters and set off in pursuit of a single plane heading towards France. He never saw the plane that hit him. Henryk falls out of the plane and manages to engage his parachute, but he hits the ground hard causing him to sprain his ankle. Shaken and covered in fuel, he is able to pack up his parachute and hide it, and hobble towards a line of trees.

That night Peggy, unable to sleep, decides to check the hen house door. Drawn to the hen house by the chickens squawking, she discovers a dirty, frightened man with no boots, wearing a flight suit and goggles on his head. He tells Peggy he cannot go back and reveals that he is a Polish pilot with the RAF and introduces himself as Henryk. Torn between turning him in and helping him, Peggy decides to hide him for the night in the abandoned church. She fetches him a pair of boots and her father's old clothing and leads him to the church before heading home.

In the morning Peggy is preoccupied with what happened during the night. Is she a traitor? She's supposed to report him to the nearest authority. She decides she will feed the missing pilot and then send him on his way. But things are not so simple. When she offers Henryk a way they can come forward, his overwhelming fear is evident. Peggy decides she will wait. What she doesn't expect is that as the days pass they will become friends and that things will become more complicated than she ever anticipated.

Discussion

That Burning Summer is one of several recent young adult novels exploring life in England during World War II. In this novel, the setting is the very south of England, in the Kent and Romney Marsh area which is just across the English Channel from France. The English, particularly people living in this area were understandably nervous about the real possibility of a German invasion.

By July of 1940, Denmark, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxemborg, Norway and France had surrendered to Germany after being invaded. Finland was captured by the Soviet Union. In June, 1940, Germany invaded the Channel Islands and in July, 1940 what was to become known as the Battle of Britain, had begun. Hitler had already signed off on a planned invasion of Britain, known as Operation Sea Lion. If an invasion was to happen, the flat coast and accessible beaches of this area offered a prime location for the Germans to land. As Syson mentions in her novel, the beaches were covered with rolls of concertina wire which also identified areas that were mined. In addition concrete pillboxes or blockhouses were also constructed along the coast as another layer of defense. The LDV (Local Defense Volunteers) was set up and comprised of men who were ineligible for military service. Their purpose was to slow down the invading troops, providing regular military units a chance to reorganize.

Syson effectively captures the uncertainty and fear many English felt in the summer of 1940 with frequent mention of the booming sounds coming from France, "the thunder across the sea." However despite their fear, each of the characters in the book reaches deep inside to act courageously. This fear is especially evident in the character of Ernest who is eleven-years-old at the beginning of the novel. His fear is shown by his obsessive attention to a pamphlet detailing what to do should England be invaded. Ernest has memorized the pamphlet and reminds himself to follow the tips for spotting an invader. He worries about almost every aspect of the invasion, about recognizing the enemy, about whether the church bells will be able to be rung in time, about whether they will hear them.

Ernest is shown to be very much like his father who is an artist and someone who abhors killing anything. When Ernest comes across the dead moles he feels disgusted and doesn't want to be involved in checking the traps but doesn't know how to tell his Uncle Fred this. "Ernest couldn't possibly tell him the truth about how he felt, though Dad would understand, of course. He didn't think it was silly or squeamish. A dead animal, in your bare hands, that you've killed yourself...? Ernest shuddered, imagining the feel of a stiff, cold body, hard under velvet." The gun given to him by Uncle Fred on his twelfth birthday is not something he's happy to receive.

Ernest is convinced he has LMF - Lack of Moral Fiber a term coined to describe RAF flyers too afraid to fly anymore. "But it's just the same, isn't it? I haven't got the moral fiber to go trapping with Uncle Fred. Or rabbit-hunting. I'm too scared. I'm no good at that kind of thing. A coward. They used to shoot cowards, you know." When Ernest visits Henryk alone, he is trying to determine if Henryk is who he claims to be. Instead, he learns about courage and why some people can no longer be brave. Henryk suggests that courage is like a bank and that it can be used up and that it cannot be made on its own. "Can you make it from nothing? I don't think so. I think perhaps...I think you get courage from other people. But when they go, it gets harder and harder. And when you know you have just a little left, and just a few people, it seems to go faster and faster. Until you are like me. Ernest, I have to tell you...I have none left. Not even the courage to die when I wished it..."

When Ernest learns the truth about his father, that he is a pacifist who took the peace pledge, he's devastated. Ernest believed is father was overseas fighting in the war.  Instead, he went away to Eastbourne where he helped conscientious objectors prepare for their hearings. Eventually he was arrested, convicted and sent to prison for handing out leaflets and newsletters outside the conscription office. Peggy reveals that their mom never told anyone in their village because she felt ashamed.  Ernest feels ashamed of his father and is determined to be different. "Ernest set the gun on his shoulder. Be like Dad, the posters said. But he would be better than his dad." He would reveal Henryk. However, Ernest ends up not facing Henryk, but a real spy, determined to silence Peggy, Ernest and Victor. When Peggy tells Ernest to run and get help, he refuses to leave her and tries to help.

Through the character of Henryk, the devastating reality of the war in Europe is shown. When Henryk's homeland of Poland was invaded, he fought the Nazis, as part of the Polish air force. Unsuccessful, he was forced to flee, enduring the pain of leaving his beloved country, travelling through Romania, Bulgaria, the Black Sea to Constantinople and then to Beirut. At a camp in Beirut, Henryk learned from his sister Gizela's letter that their parents have been murdered by the Nazis and later that his three sisters have also been murdered. Eventually he made his way to Britain, where he became part of the RAF. However, when he is shot down over Romney Marsh, Henryk is unable to turn himself in to authorities. He can no longer fly and fight. His courage is gone. Peggy recognizes that Henryk is not well. She explains to Ernest, "He twisted his ankle. But that's better now really. He's hurt in another way though. Not the kind of hurt they can do anything about in hospital, I don't think. It means he can't fly." Although Henryk believes he has no courage left, he decides to leave to protect Peggy, and on his way encounters Peggy and Ernest being attacked. Risking everything, Henryk comes to their aid, firing his revolver, something Peggy would not have believed him capable of doing just a day earlier.

Peggy must deal with her growing conflict over hiding Henryk who would be considered a deserter and the fact that she is falling in love with him. At first hiding Henryk "was like carrying around a boulder, this mistake she had made: huge and indigestible, it weighed her down." "For the first time she began to fear for herself. Maybe she was a traitor already. After all, she'd encouraged someone not to do his duty. That was a kind of treachery." Peggy remembers that they hang traitors, so she decides she will feed the missing pilot and then send him on his way. But seeing Henryk's fear she understands that he is unable to fly. With compassion she continues to hide and feed Henryk, not knowing what the future holds. Peggy too shows courage when she comes to the aid of Victor, whom she despises, but who is being drowned by the spy. "She had no hope of rescuing Victor...She was sinking. It felt hopeless. Yet Peggy refused to give up. Mrs. Velvick could not lose another son." 

The strength in That Burning Summer is its wonderful portrayal of the uncertainty and fear of the English as well as their stout determination to defend their country as the Battle of Britain begins. Syson brings the novel to an exciting conclusion and ties up all the loose ends by jumping ahead to the end of the war in 1946 in an Epilogue. The novel is rounded out with a Historical Afterword that explains about the LMF designation, peace protests, missing pilots, spies and Polish pilots in Britain. This novel would have done nicely with a map of the Romney Marsh area, and perhaps a more mysterious cover suited to the story. In her Acknowledgements, it is evident Syson did considerable historical research for That Burning Summer.

For information on the Romney Coast area during World War II, readers are directed to Romney Marsh The Fifth Continent .

Picture credits:
Romney Marsh Map: https://www.theromneymarsh.net/#marsh

Book Details:

That Burning Summer by Lydia Syson
New York: Sky Pony Press          2013
298 pp.

The Last Star by Rick Yancey

Note: those who have not read the novel should NOT visit Rick Yancey's website as there is a major spoiler by a fan on his home page.

The Last Star begins with Cassie, her little brother Sam (Nugget), the human-alien Evan Walker, Ben Parish (Zombie), Dumbo and Megan hiding out at Grace’s well stocked house. Cassie furiously confronts Evan telling him she doesn’t understand WHY the aliens killed off the human population using such cruel methods when they could have done it differently. Evan tells her that they could have lived with humans indefinitely, sharing their knowledge and bringing peace and order to the world. He tells her he wanted to do it differently but they wouldn't listen. He tells her that for ten thousand years they have had immortality. “An existence without pain, without hunger, without any physical needs at all. But immortality has a price. Without bodies, we lost the things that come with them. Things like autonomy and benevolence. Compassion.”

Ben Parish (Zombie) tells Cassie he doesn’t buy Evan’s explanations, that Ringer was right, that there is something that doesn’t add up about all this. “Ringer was right Cassie. This doesn’t make a lot of sense. He kidnaps a human body so he can murder all the unkidnapped human bodies. Then one day he decides he’d rather murder his own kind so he can save all the unkidnapped human bodies. And not just murder one or two of his kind…All of them. He wants to destroy his entire civilization, …For a girl. A girl!” Ringer didn’t understand why aliens who don’t have bodies need a planet and why they came for ours.

Ben wants to go with Dumbo to the caverns to find Ringer and Teacup. However both Cassie and Evan think he should wait until Evan blows up the mother ship. Evan tells them he needs to blow up the mother ship because on the spring equinox the ship is set to unleash bombs over the entire world that will destroy every city on Earth to complete the cleansing. This is the last step before the launch of the 5th Wave. Before the bombs are unleashed all the Silencers will be brought on the ship.

Meanwhile Ringer (Marika) who has now been enhanced with the 12th System, a nanotechnology that allows her superhuman abilities is allowed to escape the military base. Razor killed Teacup because he knew that Ringer would never leave her. He wanted her to be free to do what she needs to do. When Vosch does not come after her Ringer goes back because she believes that she needs to kill Evan Walker. Ringer knows that Vosch is human and he tells her that he is necessary to facilitate the radical intervention to save mankind. "...we were doomed to destroy ourselves and our home. The only solution was radical intervention. Destroy the human village in order to save it." Vosch tells Ringer that it wasn't enough to just destroy all of humanity, but that it had to change human nature.

He assigns another woman, Lieutenant Constance Pierce whom Ringer hates to accompany her to find Evan. In a briefing with Vosch and Pierce, Vosch reveals that a reconnaissance flight has discovered that Dumbo, Poundcake, Sullivan, Nugget, Walker and Zombie are holed up in a house about fifteen miles southeast of Urbana. However, two nights ago two people left the house heading towards the caverns. Ringer tells Vosch they are heading to the caverns to look for her. He tells Ringer that she and Pierce will be dropped in ahead of their arrival and that Pierce's job will be to bring back Evan Walker. Vosch wants Walker because his program is no longer functioning and he wants to know why. He tells Ringer once he has Walker she and her friends will be free to go. Ringer knows however that Vosch intends to kill all of them. He gives her a green capsule - a modified bomb similar to the one the child in wheat carried but six times more powerful. She refuses this at first. When Vosch asks Ringer what is the lesson of the child in the wheat, Ringer tells him that it is to kill trust and love in humans. No one can trust anyone, not even a child. "Without trust there's no cooperation. And without cooperation there's no progress. History stops." Vosch states "The answer to the human problem is the death of what makes us human."

In the C-160 Ringer tries to explain what is happening to Pierce who believes she is an alien. "Everything you think is bullshit. Who you think you are, your memories,all of it. Before you were born, they embedded a program in your brain that booted up when you hit puberty...You've been infected with a viral program that literally rewired your brain to 'remember' things that didn't happen. You aren't an alien consciousness here to wipe out humanity and colonize Earth. You're human. Like me. Like Vosch. Like everyone else. " Ringer tells Pierce that if she believes she will return to the mother ship and the 5th Wave will finish off humans she is mistaken. Instead she will be fighting the army she's created until there are no bullets to fight with. Without trust and cooperation, a perpetual Stone Age will be born which mankind will never progress out of because no one will ever trust anyone else. Constance's refusal to believe her leads Ringer to decide she has to kill Pierce and she has to kill Walker too. They are dropped in near a farmhouse and Ringer and Pierce quickly separate. Ringer experiences nausea - her second bout since returning to Vosch and she wonders if there's something wrong with the 12th System. Outside the farm, Ringer meets a priest who seems kindly enough at first. But when Ringer tells the priest she's a Silencer he attacks her. Ringer realizes that Constance was here to neutralize a Silencer. He beats Ringer and is able to penetrate into her mind discovering what happened to her, Razor and Teacup. He also tells her there is another and asks her if she knows of its existence.(This is a reference to her unborn baby.)

Back at the house, with Zombie and Dumbo gone, Cassie's little brother Sam takes an M9 Beretta he has found and hides it in the belt of his pants. Sam decides he will watch over Megan and also Evan. Evan and Cassie make love.

Meanwhile Zombie and Dumbo reach Urbana where Dumbo is shot in the back. Zombie manages to get him to a safe place, pack his wound and then sets off to find the killer. He discovers an old lady living in a boarded up room with cats. He wants to shoot her but it isn't until she attacks him that Zombie realizes he's found the Urbana Silencer. He barely survives the encounter - a cat eating old lady silencer who's been enhanced. Zombie returns to Dumbo and tells him has to leave him but promises to return.  Zombie arrives at the welcome center buildings outside the caverns where he sees a priest. After setting off a grenade, Zombie falls into a pit containing hundreds of decomposing bodies. In the pit someone calls his name and tells him to play dead. The priest peers into the pit and tells him to not be afraid, to climb out not knowing that Constance is also in the pit. She pulls the priest into the hole and blows his brains out. Out of the pit Zombie meets Constance and Ringer. Ringer lies to Zombie about how Teacup died and about who Constance really is, telling him that Constance was in the caves and that the priest began to kill people. Eventually she realized that the priest was a Silencer.

Zombie fills her in on what happened to the squad. Although Zombie is leery of Constance she wins him over by pretending to be vulnerable. They travel into Urbana and find Dumbo who has crawled out of the building Zombie left him. Dumbo dies and Zombie buries him.  Zombie wants to kill Constance but Ringer doesn't allow him even though she knows what Constance is. The three travel back to Grace's house where Constance almost immediately attempts to kill Walker. She grabs Sam when she offers him her hand to shake but takes him hostage. However Constance is killed by Sam who uses the gun hidden in his pants. Ringer wants to kill Evan but Zombie refuses and she shoots him in the thigh.

Since Constance was being tracked, Vosch knows their location and the group finds itself attacked by a Black Hawk helicopter firing hellfire. Zombie, Cassie, Sam, Megan and Evan head to the basement but Evan decides to surrender because he knows Vosch wants him. The helicopter removes Evan while three hundred meters from the house, Squad 19 is waiting to move into the house. However Ringer takes each of the kids who belong to the squad down.

Zombie watches Ringer bury the young kids and asks her what happened to her as she is no longer the person her remembers. She tells him that she is enhanced like Evan, Constance, the priest and the cat lady and that she is also pregnant - which she asks him to keep secret. Zombie brings Ringer into the basement to Cassie, Sam and Megan and tells her that Evan got on the chopper and that Ringer has killed the strike team. Ringer explains to Cassie and Zombie (Ben) what she believes has happened. She tells them that the mother ship is possibly automated and that the aliens may not even be on it and maybe never were. It's also possible that the aliens who sent the ship might even be extinct.

Cassie is not sure she believes what Ringer has told them; that alien probes found earth a few thousand years ago. After observing humans they decided that we are harmful to both ourselves and the planet and they built a mother ship. The mother ship contained bombs, drones and a viral plague. This along with the use of humans infected with a computer program would be used to wipe out ninety-nine point nine percent of Earth's population. Ringer tells her that her Silencer theory - that a computer program was downloaded into fetuses and activated at puberty to make them believe they were aliens is true and was confirmed by Vosch. What Ringer doesn't understand is why Vosch wants Evan Walker whose Silencer program malfunctioned. The next stage will be the unleashing of bombs to destroy all the cities on Earth but before that pods will be sent to pick up the Silencers. Ringer doesn't know if the pods will actually come, but she does believe that all the cities on Earth will be bombed as cities hold the memories of human civilization. A culture without memories is a dead culture.

Cassie and Ben and Ringer must now decide what to do. Cassie believes that they are now at the point where they are likely to die and that their death should be meaningful. They could flee into the wilderness, but they know eventually the 5th Wave will find them. Ringer tells them that the Black Hawk chopper will be returning to pick up the strike team. Cassie wants to hijack the Black Hawk, fly to the military base and rescue Evan Walker. She also notes this will give Ringer the chance to kill Vosch. They work out a plan, taking the uniforms from the dead strike team and their trackers so the Black Hawk will zero in on them. Before they leave, Ben finds Ringer ready to drink antifreeze to cause her to abort Razor's baby, but he refuses to allow this. He tells her he will be there for her. As the chopper returns, Ben, Sam and Megan hide under blankets so the Black Hawk won't detect their body heat and Cassie and Ringer trick their way onto the chopper. They force the pilot, Bob to fly all of them to the Ohio caverns where they leave Ben, Sam and Megan. Bob flies Cassie and Ringer towards the military base so they can be captured as planned. Ringer knows that Vosch will now be aware of the dead strike team and the commandeered chopper. Cassie and Ringer's plan is the only one that seems to offer any hope to mankind. But what will the cost be? And can they succeed in turning the tide in the war against humanity?

Discussion

The Last Star is an exciting finale to the 5th Wave series by Rick Yancey. Like the previous novels in the series it is detailed, lengthy and intense. It presents readers with the fate of all the remaining characters in the novel. In the Last Star, although the cast of characters remaining has dwindled, the main characters are Cassie and Ringer. It is Ringer who learns what is really happening and who understands how the alien program has functioned, but it is Cassie who out of love for her brother Sam, makes the ultimate sacrifice. And that's the main theme of this novel, the mystery of human love and how it is humanity's most redeeming quality. It turns out, love is the one thing the aliens who were observing Earth could not understand.

Ringer's theories about what is really going on are confirmed when Evan is captured and Vosch reveals to him the truth of the alien invasion. He tells Evan that a mechanical owl visited his mother when she was pregnant with him and installed the program into his developing brain and then returned when he went through puberty to give him the 12th System. Vosch also reveals that there are no aliens on board the mother ship nor inside of him. He brags to Evan about the carefully constructed program designed to save Earth.   "It is completely automated, like your old friend here, designed by its makers after centuries of careful study and deliberation and sent to this planet to wean the human population to a sustainable level. And, of course, to keep it there indefinitely by changing human nature itself...A flawless, self-sustaining loop, an immaculate system in which trust and cooperation can never take root." The goal was to change human nature so that it would be indifferent to the suffering others.

However, unexpectedly Evan reveals a fatal flaw in the alien's plan. Evan's Silencer program, installed in him when he was still in utero seems to have failed as he did not complete his mission of killing Cassie when he found her. Vosch captures Evan because he needs to find out the cause of the failure. After running tests on Evan, Vosch realizes that love - Evan's love for Cassie is what overrode his Silencer program. "She may be right: Love may be the singularity, the inexplicable, ungovernable, ineffable mystery, impossible to predict or control, the virus that crashed a program designed by beings next to which we are no more evolved than a cockroach." And so Vosch decides that his answer to Ringer's claim will be to erase what Evan loves so that he will kill. He will remove Evan's human qualities, erase his memories of Cassie and turn him into a Silencer he was meant to be. He will be a human indifferent to the suffering of others.

Later, when Ringer is lying broken after her encounter with Evan who is now a Silencer, Vosch finds her. He tells Ringer he's been on the mother ship and that he agreed to work the program in exchange for having his consciousness preserved aboard the mother ship. He also tells Ringer that these aliens have "saved" other planets besides Earth. Vosch admits that there was no flaw in Evan's programming, that the aliens simply had no understanding of love and therefore could not develop an algorithm to deal with this factor.

When Cassie and Ringer break into the military base, they find the room where memories are downloaded into Wonderland, a program that stores memories and winnows out the weak soldiers in the 5th Wave. They hope to locate Evan by finding his memories which will tell them what happened to him here. But sifting through all the millions of downloaded memories to find Evan's will take too long, so Cassie courageously has all the memories of people downloaded into her mind including those of Evan before Vosch erased him. From his memories she learns that the aliens had no answer for love, no solution for love. She sees what Vosch told Evan: "They thought they could crush it out of us, burn it from our brains, replace love with its opposite - not hate, indifference. They thought they could turn men into sharks." This was a reference to the alien's belief that in order to save humanity they needed to make men like sharks. Studying Earth they discovered rule the ocean because "their complete indifference to everything except feeding, procreation, and defending their territory. The shark does not love. It feels no empathy. It trust nothing. It lives in perfect harmony with its environment because it has no aspirations or desires. And no pity. A shark feels no sorrow, no remorse, hopes for nothing, dreams of nothing, has no illusions about itself or anything beyond itself."

The major symbol of the mystery of love in the novel is Sam's teddy bear, named Bear.  Sam Sullivan's bear is a symbol of the indomitable force that is love. Cassie marvels that of all the things mankind has accomplished, from inventing poetry to designing rockets to take man into space, the "most wonderful thing of all ...is stuffing wads of polyester into an anatomically incorrect, cartoonish ideal of one of nature's most fearsome predators for no other reason than to soothe a child." Sam's bear motivated Cassie to continue to fight after Sam goes missing in the first novel. She hung onto his bear as a sign of hope and her love for her little brother.

In The Last Star, Sam refuses to take back his teddy, Bear, after having given him to Megan. He is a soldier now and done with toys. Megan has renamed him Captain, but Sam tells her his name is Bear and that he can't have a new name like the rest of the squad because he isn't a part of it -an oblique reference to what Bear really stands for. Bear is love and love has no part of a soldier. However, when Sam tries to give Bear to Cassie before she and Ringer leave for the military base, Cassie refuses. She tells him to keep Bear, that he's very important. "So hang on to him, understand? You take care of him and protect him and don't let anybody hurt him. Bear is very important to the grand scheme of things. He's like gravity. Without him, the universe would fall apart." This is Cassie telling her younger brother that love is the most important thing of all because it is what keeps us human and what holds the world together. He needs to remember what love is and how he was loved by their parents, by her.

This is an important message for Sam because he's lost the ability to trust people - exactly what the alien program wants. At the house Sam feels he cannot trust anyone any more. "There's no way to tell who's human anymore. Evan Walker looked human but he wasn't, not inside, not where it matters. Even people like Megan, who are human - maybe- couldn't be trusted, because you can't know what the enemy has done to them. Zombie, Cassie, Dumbo... you can't really trust them, either. They could be just like Evan Walker." Sam has also lost his faith in God. "He used to pray every night, all the time, and the only answer God ever gave was no...You can't trust God, either. Even God is a liar...All the people who died must have prayed too, and God said, No, no, no, seven billion times, seven billion nos, God said no, no, no." But what is the antidote for a lack of trust in others? Unconditional love.

The fates of all the remaining characters are sorted out in The Last Star. Perhaps the most interesting is that of the character Vosch. Vosch turns out to be the facilitator of the entire cleansing of Earth. He tells Evan, "I have been entrusted with the greatest mission in human history: the salvation of our species. Like you, I've known since I was a boy what was coming. Unlike you, I knew the truth." This suggests that Vosch was given a program that would make him the manager of the cleansing. He also reveals his loneliness to Evan and that only a few knew the reality of the invasion. He sees himself as much a victim as Evan is.

Ringer whose real name is Marika is the one character who seems to have grasped the reality of what is happening. The strategy of the alien programing was to wipe out most of humanity and reset it in order to save the planet and humans. Ringer states, " 'Not enough to level what we built. We'll repopulate. We'll rebuild. To save the planet, to save our species, they have to change us.' She touches her chest. 'Here. If the Others can take away trust, they take away cooperation. Take away cooperation, and civilization is impossible.' " Ultimately it was a battle over the heart of humans, but the aliens were at a disadvantage because they couldn't understand the human heart and its ability to love. The proof of the power of love is in the relationship that develops between Ringer and Ben. She reveals that she can't go on but Ben tells her he will carry her.

The Last Star ends hopefully despite the tragic end of one of the main characters. However the reader is left feeling that this was not a senseless loss because it leads to a turn in the war. The Last Star is well written, filled with sequences that are both thrilling and terrifying. It is a study in human nature, what makes us human, and challenges us to define the purpose of our existence in the universe.

Book Details:

The Last Star by Rick Yancey
New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons       2016
338 pp.

Soul Surfer - the movie

Last night I had an opportunity to finally watch Soul Surfer on DVD. Unfortunately, where I live, this movie was only in theatres for a very short time and I missed that window. Most unfortunate, because this is a movie worth watching.

Soul Surfer is an exceptional movie about an exceptional young woman - Bethany Hamilton. It traces the sequences of events that led to that fateful day of Halloween, 2003 when Bethany was attacked by a On that day Bethany and her best friend Alana Blanchard and Blanchard's father and brother went surfing at Tunnels Beach on Kauai. Bethany had her left arm over the surf board in the water when she was attacked by a 14 foot tiger shark. It is unlikely she would have survived if it were not for Blanchard's quick action of improvising a tourniquet out of a surfboard leash to stem the loss of blood.

There are two things I especially liked about this movie. The first is that there was less focus on the dramatic attack and more on Bethany and her experience after the attack. The drama of the attack lasted only seconds and the race to get her medical help was well done, intense and frightening. But Bethany Hamilton is not to be defined by the attack but instead by her response. She showed herself to be remarkably poised and courageous.

That she survived at all after having lost 60 per cent of her blood, amazed doctors and her friends and family alike. God, in His providence, reminded her during the ambulance ride that he would not abandon her. One of the paramedics whispered this reminder in her ear during the run.

One of my favourite parts of the movie occurs when Bethany goes to see Sarah Hill (Carrie Underwood), her youth minister not long after she is out of hospital. When Sarah asks Bethany how she is, Bethany replies, "I'm good. Yeah. Everyone is doing real good." At that point Sarah tells Bethany that she can level with her and tell her how it REALLY is. Bethany tells Sarah that she has been trying to get some perspective, to step back and see things how they really are. She asks Sarah, "How can this be God's plan for me. I don't understand." Sarah replies, "I don't know why terrible things happen to us sometimes. But I have to believe something good is going to come out of this. I don't know what that is."

Of course, this is the struggle all believers eventually experience because all of us will experience something bad in our lives at some point. It wasn't God's plan for her to be attacked, but he had a new plan when that happened and she allowed God to work in her life. Her mother, in one of the special features on the DVD, relates that during the month prior to the attack Bethany and her family had been praying to understand what God wanted of Bethany in her life. This film does portray their strong faith and commitment to Christ, but not in an overhanded manner. It's subtle and believable.

Much of the actual surfing in the re-creation of the competitions was done by Bethany. This was apparently another of the Hamilton's goals in the movie, to demonstrate good surfing to those of us who know nothing about the sport. The surfing shots were brilliant and exciting. I can understand why Bethany felt such a desire to return to the ocean. The beauty and power of ocean was both awesome and inspiring.

This movie was well done and nice change from the usual Hollywood fare. Bethany's book of the same name continues to be a popular choice for teens, although it is written for very young teens and tweens.

You can catch all the latest on Bethany Hamilton at her website, including information on her injury to her right arm this summer.

For Freedom. The Story of a French Spy by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley

For Freedom tells the true story of Suzanne David, a former opera singer AND a spy for France.

It is May 29, 1940. Thirteen-year-old Suzanne David lives in Cherbourg with her papa, maman and her brothers, fourteen-year-old Pierre and sixteen-year-old Etienne. Her brothers are too young to be soldiers and Etienne is lame as well. Suzanne attends the convent school located high above Cherbourg in the hills. After a defining solo in the church at Christmas Suzanne was told she has promise as an opera singer. And so she is studying to be an opera singer under the tutelage of Madame Marcelle. 

On this Wednesday however, Suzanne and her friend Yvette Gireau have been given permission by Soeur Margritte to go down to the town provided they finish their homework. For the past six months, France has been at war with Nazi Germany. The French and British armies had been unsucessful in stopping the Germans from taking over much of Europe. Suzanne and her family have seen the British soldiers in Cherbourg: they are polite and do not bother anyone. But everyone is filled with increasing dread because they know Hitler is coming.

In Cherbourg, Suzanne and Yvette go to Place Napoleon which is a large square located near the train station, Gare Maritime, and sit on a bench in front of the Church of Le Trinitie. Suzanne notices that the harbour is empty on this sunny afternoon.In the square Madame Montagne and her little son, Simon come to say hello to the two girls. Madame, who is expecting another baby, tells Simon not to get his feet wet. Suddenly the square, the beach explode as planes fly overhead.  

While Suzanne and Yvette had sheltered beneath the park bench, Madame Montagne was not so lucky. She was dead, her unborn baby, a little girl lay dead beside her. Yvette is in shocking, screaming as Suzanne pulls off her sweater to cover Madame's corpse. Although Yvette wants to run, Suzanne insists that they wait by Madame Montagne until the ambulance arrives. Although Suzanne is shaking, Yvette is deeply traumatized, shaking, crying and she vomits. The two friends manage to make their way back to the convent, where Yvette collapses. Soeur Marie-Auguste, who is the principal, walks Suzanne home.

Suzanne's mother is shocked when she sees her daughter covered in blood. Suzanne explains that she is not hurt but that Madame Montagne is dead. Dr. Leclerc tells Suzanne that she has rock and metal - shrapnel embedded in her lower arms and legs. He removes as much as he can and cleans her wounds, telling her that she may have pieces of shrapnel in her body for the rest of her life. Suzanne tells him she wants to remember nothing of what happened this day, but he remarks that she is very strong.

The next morning, Suzanne's maman walks her back to school. Suzanne doesn't see Yvette at morning Mass but doesn't want to turn around and risk angering the sisters. But Suzanne doesn't see Yvette all day and when she questions Soeur Elisabeth she tells her that Yvette "isn't hurt in her body" but that what they saw yesterday has hurt her. At her music lesson with Madame Marcelle, Suzanne struggles to focus. She is learning a new music written by J.S. Bach, his Magnificat. The music helps ground Suzanne, making her feel safe.

When Yvette doesn't reture to school the following day, Suzanne visits her friend at home. But despite attempting to engage her, Yvette says nothing. Madame Gireau asks Suzanne to come visit again. That night Suzanne's brother return home from the monastery school they attend and they are critical of Suzanne's decision to go to the beach that day. This is when Suzanne learns about the evacuation of four hundred thousand British and French soldiers from Dunkirk by many hundreds of boats. Now Suzanne understands why the harbour was so empty.

Numb with grief, Suzanne helps her mother with shopping at the market on Saturday. Just walking through Napoleon Square brings back the memory of what happened there. On Sunday Suzanne's widowed Aunt Suzanne visits with her six children after Mass. On Monday with the beginning of year end exams, Suzanne and the other students learn that Paris has been bombed. Suzanne had gone to Yvette's home early in the hopes they would walk back to school but Madame Gireau explains that her daughter cannot possibly go to school at this time. At school the students pray the rosary for France. Afterwards, in the dorm room that Suzanne shares with Odette, Martine and Colette, she refuses to talk about the bombing in Cherbourg.

On June 14, the French government declares Paris to be an open city that they would not defend in exchange for the Germans not destroying the city. Panic set in and millions fled the city but Suzanne's two uncles did not.Both of Suxanne's brothers are upset that the Germans have taken over Paris: Etienne wishes he could fight but he is not able to after breaking his back in a fall down the stairs, while Pierre wants to fight the Germans. 

The Germans are close to Cherbourg. The French battleships have either left for England or been deliberately sunk so the Germans cannot use them. Papa tells them that the great General Charles de Gaulle whom he fought under has been warning about Germany for years and that France needed to rearm. Now it is too late. Marshal Petain is now premier of France, but Suzanne's papa believes he is too old and has lost his courage. 

The war comes to Cherbourg as the German army under the command of General Rommel approaches the city. The remnants of the French army fight but quickly succumb to the Germans. The city officials surrender to the Germans and give them the railroad. When Pierre is not happy upon hearing that Papa works as a dispatcher for the Germans, his father explains that he could work for them and recieve his pay to support his family or he could be shot. Suzanne's father takes the position that in order to survive one must "obey the rules and no one gets hurt."

One Wednesday, the Germans burst into Suzanne's home and order them out, after they quickly gather up some of their possessions. The German officer gives them thirty minutes to pack what they need. The houses on two streets Rue Lohen and Rue Loubet as well as the chateau, the hotel and some city buildings. Suzanne's home is on Rue Lohen and the houses on that street were used to house regular German troops. Suzanne's family is taken in by Monsieur and Madame Herbert who allow them to stay in their basement. It takes Suzanne's father three weeks before he is able to find them another place to live.

Meanwhile, France is now divided: the occupied portion that is under the control of the German army and the southern part, called Vichy France under the control of Hitler's puppet regime. Suzanne and her papa feel the Vichy government are traitors. Suzanne and her mother discover the Saturday market has been closed and they are told not to come there again. Suzanne and her family move into the second floor of a rickety house overlooking the cemetery. There is a kitchen, a livingroom, a bathroom, and two bedrooms. An alcove, meant to be a pantry serves as Suzanne's bedroom. Although the apartment smells of old grease, Suzanne realizes that this is the best her papa can do. Papa tells them that General de Gaulle is safe in England and is organizing a government there.

Life begins to change in subtle ways. One day Suzanne sees Guillame, her roommate Odette's brother who was a lieutenant in the French army. Suzanne calls out to him but when he ignores her she realizes that if the Germans learned he was a soldier, he would be arrested and sent to a war camp. Pierre also notes that there was a German soldier behind him in the bakery whom he did not notice. Papa warns them to be careful what they say as there are men and women who are Nazi spies.

Life in Cherbourg goes on:  Suzanne helps Maman, continues her singing lessons with Madame Marcelle, and visitsYvette who still was not talking. Food is rationed with beef, sugar, butter and flour now scarce, wine and cigarettes are rationed. By the end of August, Suzanne begins to notice that people are disappearing. These disappearances coincided with the first of new laws restricting French Jews and also the banning of books by Jewish authors.

In the spring of 1941, Etienne graduates and finds work as a shop clerk, however due to his bad back, he finds the work exhausting. In the summer Suzanne begins taking music lessons three times a week in Madame Marcelle's apartment. She continues to sing in the church choir and is given a new solo to learn for the Feast of the Assumption. Suzanne often would visit her Aunt Suzanne who lived in the country. 

Suxanne and Pierre began their final year of school in the fall of 1941. Suzanne wanted to join the Cherbourg opera company but Madame Marcelle told her she was not yet ready for a such an endeavour.  She continues to miss Yvette whom she considered her best friend. However, Yvette continues to remain at home. She still doesn't speak but she does do the chores that her mother asks of her. In December of 1941, the United States enters the war after the bombing of Pearl Harbor by the Japanese. Suzanne now hopes that maybe this will mean the eventual defeat of the Nazis. 

After a discussion about spies and the Resistance, Suzanne begins to wonder who might be a Nazi spy as she walks through town. Her family learns that their street has been abandoned by the Germans and so they make the decision to go see their home. To their horror, all their possessions are gone, the beautiful mural that Suzanne's mother painted defaced, and the house stripped bare. Suzanne struggles to understand the wanton destruction and the theft of personal items:"Why had they taken things that meant nothing to them?...Everything was gone. I walked around and around my empty room, trying to make sense of it. Gone were clothes, toys, books and photographs." Her family decide to clean the house and they are able to recover some of their possessions which the Germans sold. But while her parents are able to find a lumpy old mattress, Suzanne and her brothers have to sleep on pallets.

In the spring of 1942, Suzanne, now fifteen-years-old, graduates from her convent school. Madame Marcelle informs Suzanne that she is now ready to perform and that she should audition for the part of Josepha, the lead in L'Auberge du Cheval Blanc, the Inn of the White Horse. It is a light opera being performed by the Cherbourg opera company and perfect for Suzanne to begin her career.  Although Suzanne is concerned that she may not get the part because she is too young, Madame Marcelle tells her not to worry, that she has told the director that she would send Suzanne when she was ready. Suzanne is successful and cast as Josepha and performs at the matinee. Madame Marcelle takes her to sing at various venues in Bayeux and Saint-Lo, to various voice instructors, and to concerts. 

In July the Nazis begin rounding up Jews in Cherbourg. While Suzanne did not notice anyone disappearing, her uncle in Paris had seen this happen and tried to intervene. Throughout the fall, Suzanne sang the role of Mimi in La Boheme, Etienne worked part time, and Pierre was employed running messages for customers at a hotel. On November 11, Vichy France is invaded by the German and Italian armies: now all of France is occupied.

In the spring of 1943, Suzanne accidently cut herself with a knife when she tripped. The cut was in her shoulder and quickly became infected. Shortly afterwards, Suzanne was cast as the lead in the opera, Carmen. However, her cut was now so severely infected that she had to see Dr. Leclerc to have the abscess drained. When she returned to have her stitches removed, Dr. Leclerc revealed that he was a spy with Resistance and invited Suzanne, who travelled a great deal to join. He tells her she cannot tell anyone, not her parents, her brothers or Madame Marcelle. When Suzanne goes to see Dr. Leclerc upon her return from Saint-Lo, he tells her that he receives messages that he needs her to carry. Is Suzanne brave enought to help France resist the Nazis? Her prayers for courage are answered as Suzanne become spy number 22.

Discussion

The novel, For Freedom: The Story of a French Spy is based on the experiences of Suzanne David Hall as a French teenager during the Nazi occupation of France in World War II. Suzanne was born January 23, 1927 in Cherbourg, France to Etienne and Desiree Ledoux David. She was thirteen-years-old when Paris was occupied by the Nazis on June 14, 1940. They arrived in Cherbourg on June 17, 1940 and occupied the city until the Allied invasion in 1944. The town was liberated during the Normany invasion that began on June 6, 1944. Cherbourg was a deep water port necessary to the Allied invasion plans. 

Suzanne's determination to fight against the Nazis stemmed from the bombing of Cherbourg and what she witnessed on May 29, 1940 when the Germans bombed the port and the town square. As portrayed in the novel, Suzanne and her friend Yvette witnessed the gruesome death of Madame Montagne and her unborn baby. Yvette never really recovered from what she experienced that day. The Germans confiscated Suzanne's family's home and all the homes on her street. They were ordered out and were not able to return until three years later in 1943. In the novel, Suzanne and her family return in what seems to be either late 1941 or early 1942. The novel incorporates the basic facts of Suzanne's life, from her witnessing the death of Madame Montagne, to her training as an opera singer, and her recruitment by Dr. Leclerc as a spy for the French Resistance. With her acceptance, Suzanne became spy number 22. He would give Suzanne encrypted messages which she  could not read to pass on to other spies whose identities she did not know. 

In the Epilogue, Suzanne David states that the messages she carried contained information that would help the Allies plan the invasion of Europe: things like tides and currents, potential landing sites, and the location of German troops. The Battle of Cherbourg began on June 22, 1944. The Nazis considered the deep water port of Cherbourg to be essential and were determined to defend it at any cost. The Allies required the port for logistical support of the invasion and eventually took control of Cherbourg and the port on July 26. 

Suzanne's life was saved by the June 6th invasion by the Allies. She had been captured by the Nazis and was being interogated in Cherbourg. She later learned that of the twenty-two spies working in Cherbourg, only herself and one other agent survived. The others were executed including Dr. Leclerc and his entire family who were shot in the street.  Suzanne was awarded the Croix de Lorraine by Charles de Gaulle. Suzanne married an American soldier, Larson Hall and moved to Tennessee where she lived out the rest of her life. 

Suzanne had been training as an opera singer and had performed in numerous operas. However, during a performance of Rigoletto, in Paris during 1944,  Suzanne damaged her vocal cords. Her move to Tennessee with her American husband meant her career as an opera singer was over. She never learned if her voice recovered as she never again sang professionally. 

For Freedom adequately portrays life in occupied France during World War II. As with many French citizens, Suzanne struggles to accept what has happened with the German occupation of France. Forced from their home and now living in a squalid apartment overlooking the cemetery, she tells her papa they have taken so much, including Madame Montagne's life. But he tells her, "...our lives belong to the Lord. The Nazi's have not taken our work, Suzanne. They have not taken your voice. They have not taken our courage or our faith. We haven't lost anything of value."

While Suzanne's father has been forced to choose between helping the Nazis run the French trains or being shot, other members of the family and the people of Cherbourg rebel in subtle ways. Etienne walked around with three pencils the colour of the French flag in his shirt pocket, Monsieur Vardin walks about town wearing a white armband with the initials RAF on it. When he is accosted by the German soldiers he tells them it means "rein a fumer" or "nothing to smoke". 

When the Nazis begin burning books written by Jews, Suzanne doesn't understand why she should be concerned. But Madame Marcelle explains that it is wrong to burn them because like music, books are art and shouldn't be banned. When Suzanne questions her roommates at school, they realize that they know very few Jews because Cherbourg is mostly Catholic and that any Jews they know do not look any different. 

Although they endure food rationing and shortages, the reality of life under Nazi rule is not really explored in depth. Like other French citizens, Suzanne experiences questioning by soldiers and once when forgetting her identification papers, she and Madame Marcelle were forced to spend the night hidden in a hay bale as they would not have been able to pass through a German checkpoint. She struggles to find warm clothing and dresses to fit. The rounding up and deportation of French Jews doesn't seem to be central to her war experience probably because Cherbourg was a mainly Catholic town. 

However, the focus on the story is Suzanne's work as a spy. Suzanne's eventual work as a spy is foreshadowed early in the novel. At home her family discusses if General de Gaulle is a spy. Her father notes that he himself is not a spy.  "I stared at Papa, hearing his words over in my mind: if I were a spy. I didn't think for one moment that Papa was actually a spy, but the phrase awakened a sense of possibility in me. I'd understood from the start of the war that there people in France spying on the French for the Germans, but I hadn't considered that the opposite must be true, that there were people spying on the Germans. Fighting for the Free French. Fighting for de Gaulle."

It is Suzanne's inner strength, her courage that ultimately leads to her becoming a spy for the Resistance. This courage manifests itself from the beginning of the war. The bombing of the town square in Cherbourg, while devastating to her friend Yvette, does not impact Suzanne in the same way.  Dr. Leclerc quickly notes Suzanne's strength of character. As she's being treated by Dr. Leclerc after the bombing he notes her strength. " 'So? You are not one who cries, eh?' Dr. Leclerc patted my cheek with approval...'Tough girl.' " Years later when she visits Dr. Leclerc for treatment of a wound in her shoulder, he is impressed with her courage and toughness. He forewarns her that he will have to cut her open with a knife and that he has nothing to alleviate her pain.  "The pain was worse than I thought it could be, much worse than the pain of the abscess itself.  I didn't cry out. I held still."  

It is these qualities plus the fact that as a performer who travels throughout France that prompts Leclerc to ask Suzanne if she would like to help him in his "work" - the work of carrying messages. He tells her, "And if you agree to help me, you can never back out. Not ever, no matter what. You must help me until the very end."   Suzannne agrees but when she meets Dr Leclerc later he questions if she is afraid. He tells her, "If you aren't brave enough, it is better that you say so now...If you lose heart later, you will endanger others besides yourself. You will endanger me, my family, and many people you don't know. Do you think you have enough courage?"  Dr. Leclerc explains that she will pass on coded messages to people she will not know.  Madame Marcelle advises Suzanne, "When you tell a lie first, say as little as possible. If you do something without explanation, it's less suspicious than if your explanation makes no sense. Second, always be as truthful as possible. Keep all the details absolutely true, except for the little central part that can't escape being a lie. The more truth you can put into the lie, the less likely it is that you'll trip yourself." This advice foreshadows Suzanne's future capture by the Nazis for her work as a spy for the Resistance.

In For Freedom, Brubaker Bradley highlights the central role her Catholic faith played during this difficult time of her life. In the novel Suzaane frequently prays for others and for courage. After the bombing of the town square, Suzanne prays for the little boy, Simon Montagne whom she doesn't see anywhere. " Please, God, let him have run home...Please, God, let him live."  While learning to sing J.S. Bach's Magnificat, Suzanne thinks, "There had to be a God, I thought. A vibrant, joyous God in heaven, to make up for the awfulness of what people sometimes did on earth. There had to be a heaven, so that Madame Montagne had a place to go."

Suzanne David's strong Catholic faith was to sustain her in her work in the Resistance. Upon learning that Dr. Leclerc is involved in spying, Suzanne prays, "Dear God, make me strong." Anyone working against the Nazis in France was executed, so the danger was very real for Suzanne and her family. When she is given her first assignment Suzanne prays, "Mary, Mother of God...you will have to help me. Give me strength." 

After Suzanne was taken in by the Germans for questioning, she remained strong and prayed. "I didn't cry. I didn't give in. I made my voice soft, level, so that I would not further harm my vocal cords. In the intervals of silence they granted me, I prayed. Je vous salue, Marie, plein de grace, le Seigneur et avec vous,.. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with you. I would have counted a rosary on my fingers, but the silence never lasted that long. I prayed, Make me strong." Suzanne remained strong long enough that she was saved by the Allied invasion that began a day later on Tuesday June 6th, 1944. 

For Freedom is a short, high interest novel about an important French heroine in World War II. It is recommended for students who might not be avid readers and need something that is high interest or who require a short historical novel for English class. A map showing the location of Cherbourg and the beaches involved in the Normandy Invasion would have been helpful.

Book Details:
For Freedom. The Story of a French Spy by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley
New York: Dell Laurel-Leaf           2003
181 pp.