Stubby: A True Story of Friendship by Michael Foreman

2018 was the 100th anniversary of the armistice that ended World War I and to commemorate it, a fair number of books for young readers were published. Stubby is one of those books and his story begins in a training camp far away from the war.



For some soldiers, basic training can be a cold lonely process of endless drills and exercises. But in one particular camp, each time the bugle calls soldier's to a meal, stray dogs from all over always seem to show up, too. One of them takes a real liking to one particular soldier [Robert Conroy] and before you know it, man and dog have bonded. The soldier names the dog Stubby.



Stubby is pretty smart, and learns to sit and to salute quickly and, of course, everyone seems to love him, But when orders come that the soldiers are shipping out, sailing across the Atlantic to a land at war [France]. Stubby is supposed to stay home, but at the last minute, he gets smuggled on to the troop ship.



In the trenches, Stubby's excellent sense of smell and hearing more than once comes in handy, catching enemy soldiers who sneak into the trenches, or warning the men of poison gas attacks in time to put on their gas masks (yes, Stubby also has a gas mask), and sometimes just keeping his master warm on cold, rainy nights.



But when Stubby is injured in battle, he is sent off in an ambulance with other wounded soldiers and his owner wonders if they will ever see each other again. But, Stubby's nursed back to health at a field hospital just like a real soldier, and after six weeks, he is returned to the tranches. When the enemy is finally driven out a one town, the local ladies get together and make Stubby his own army jacket, complete with medals and badges.



When peace is finally declared in 1918, Stubby returns home to the United States a hero and is even given a position of honor at the front of a victory parade.



This is a sweet story, not so much about Stubby heroics during the war, though these are certainly included, but about what a good, loyal companion he was to Conroy. And to keep the story focused on Stubby, Foreman never uses Conroy's name and makes the dog the main focus of the illustrations.   

The illustrations are done in Foreman's signature style, using a soft pastel palette. He doesn't shy away from the realities of war, but none of the battlefield illustrations are so graphic they would upset young readers. Even the illustration of Stubby laying unconscious in the midst of fighting isn't frightening, but kids will definitely know Stubby is injured.



Be sure to read Forman's note at the back of the book, complete with a photo of Stubby in his army jacket.



Stubby: A True Story of Friendship is a heartwarming story, made all the more poignant by the fact that it is a true story.



You can download an extensive Teaching Guide courtesy of the publisher, Anderson Press



This book is recommended for readers age 5+

This book was purchased for my personal library

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The Eleventh Hour written and illustrated Jacques Goldstyn

Contains Spoilers

Since the last book I reviewed here was a WWI story, I thought it would be a good time to look at The Eleventh Hour, a WWI picture book for older readers (7+). It is the story of two friends who ultimately find themselves on the battlefield, and give the poppy on the cover, I assume they fought on Flanders Field.



Jules and Jim are born in the same town on the same day in a small Canadian town. Jim is born first, followed by Jules two minutes later, setting a life long pattern of Jim being on time, Jules being late. Because they are next door neighbors, the boys play with each other as babies, and become childhood best friends. They like to do the same things, but it is always clear that Jim is the leader: '...Jim always took the lead. He was faster and stronger than Jules, but since they were friends, Jim always looked out for Jules. Everyone agreed: Jules and Jim were an odd pair."



The two remain best friends as they grow up and when Britain and Germany go to war in 1914, Canada also goes to war (at the time, Canada was a British dominion). Both Jim and Jules enlist in the army. And just like always, Jules is a little behind Jim, who gets the best fitting uniform, does better in basic training and sails to Europe in a big new convoy ship. Showing up two minutes late, Jules ends up in an ill fitting uniform, spends basic training peeling potatoes, and misses sailing to Europe in the same ship as his best friend.



War isn't exactly what they expected, but they do their duty in the trenches, fighting the Germans, the wet cold, the lice, and the rats in the trenches and obeying orders. Jules and Jim never really understood the war and even envy prisoners, for whom the war is over. The war gets much worse before it gets better, but finally, on November 11, 1918, an armistice is signed and the cease fire is scheduled to happen at 11 o'clock that morning. At 10:58 AM, following an order to attack, Jim is killed on the battlefield and Jules is devastated.



Jules returns home without his best friend, and tries to live a normal life, but can't stop thinking about Jim. After trying all kinds of jobs, Jules becomes a watchmaker, and although his watches work well, they nevertheless always run two minutes behind.



Originally written in French (Jules et Jim: frères d'armes) and skillfully translated by Anne Louise Mahoney, who never loses the wry humor or the poignancy of the story, The Eleventh Hours is an incredibly sad book. Each time I've read it, it brings tears to my eyes, but it is also an incredibly powerful anti-war story. It is based on a true story and dedicated to the memory of George Lawrence Price, the last Canadian to die in WWI, when he was killed at 10:58 AM, just two minutes before WWI ended.



Goldstyn is a political cartoonist and is quite adapt at creating a strong story with one illustration. And The Eleventh Hour is not different. Despite the economy of words and spare line and watercolor illustrations, Goldstyn nevertheless paints a full picture of more than a life long friendship, and life in the trenches, he also manages to include what life was life on the home front, giving a well rounded picture of how war impacted life during WWI, and from which one can easily extrapolate that these tragedies and hardships are same realities of war in general.



The Eleventh Hour is a book that will appeal to historical fiction fans, those interested in WWI history, and definitely to pacifists like myself.



This book is recommended for readers age 7+

This book was purchased for my personal library

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Threads of Blue by Suzanne LaFleur

Threads of Blue is the sequel to Beautiful Blue World, a story about children involved in an nameless war between fictional countries, a landscape that bears an uncanny resemblance to Europe. After being tested for their suitably, some children of Sofarende are sent away from their families to a remote area called Faetre as part of an Adolescent Army unit, where they worked on important intelligenc for the war effort. While in Faetre, the children were not allowed any contact with their families. 



You may recall that at the end of Beautiful Blue World, Mathilde Joss, 12, had committed what might be considered an act of treason that had caused her to become separated from the other members of her Adolescent Army unit as they are being evacuated to the safety of Eilean, an ally of Sofarende.



Now, Mathilde must try and find out where the Adolescent Army is on Eilean, after being brought across the sea that separates it from Sofarende. There is danger everywhere, even on Eliean, but Mathilde meets a kind family who takes her to a refugee camp to wait until she is eventually reunited with the other Sofarende kids and adults in her unit.



Once reunited with them, Mathilde waits to see if she will be punished for what she did before leaving Sofarende. And, even worse, her best friend Megs refuses to speak to her or even look at her for reasons Matilde can’t figure out, yet everyone else is as friendly as they had always been. Meanwhile, as Sofarende falls to the constant bombing of its enemy Tyssia, Mathilde works on maps to determine where their air force should drop their bombs in Sofarende in order to drive out the Tyssians.



While Mathilde tries to deal with some of the moral and ethical issues inherent in her war work and war in general, she must also come to terms with loss on several levels. Surprisingly, she gets help from an unexpected source, and moral support from others. All Mathilde really wants is to be best friends with Megs again, and to return to her beloved home and family. But then the horror of war, and the senseless killing and destruction that comes with it are brought home to Mathilde when she is sent to Sofarende on a secret mission. Will this young girl ever find the love and peace she craves?



If you haven’t read Beautiful Blue World, I would recommend doing so, but even if you don’t, you will have no problem reading Threads of Blue. There is enough explanation of the events from the first book embedded in this sequel so you won’t be lost.



The story is told from Mathilde's point of view, though experience has taken some of the innocence out of her stream-of-consciousness observations. She astutely describes life as a refugee living in a camp set up for Sofarenders fleeing their country as the war intensifies: the constant hunger, the inability to wash, the feelings of frustration everyone feels, all while mourning the loss of their country and loved ones. And when she returns to her homeland, she is stunned by the extent of ruin that the war had inflicted. In that respect, the images LaFleur word paints are particularly poignant and so, so very anti-war.   



Along that vein, look closely at the cover image of three children, two boys and a girl wearing a knapsack, who is obviously Mathilde, sitting in a row boat. They couldn't look more innocent, until you look more closely and see the faint shadows of bombs falling on them. This image says so much.



Like Beautiful Blue World, Threads of Blue is a brilliant novel about the ravages of war, but it is also a story about holding on to who you really are even when it causes you trouble, and facing life with bravado, honesty, and hope in a world where none seems to exist. These are two books not to be missed.



This book is recommended for readers age 9+

This book was purchased for my personal library.

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The Peace Tree from Hiroshima: The Little Bonsai with a Big Story by Sandra Moore, illustrated by Kazumi Wilds

This is the story of a bonsai tree that was lovingly dug up on the island of Miyajima almost 400 years ago by a man name Itaro Yamaki, as a souvenir of the trees that had touched his heart on that beautiful, lush island.

Itaro cared for the bonsai for over fifty years, passing it on to his son Wajiro when he could not longer care for it. And so generation after generation of the Yamaki fathers and sons passed on the care and careful sculpting of Miyajima, as Itaro has originally named it.

Miyajima thrived year after year, even after the Yamakis moved to Hiroshima. But on August 6, 1945, an atomic bomb was dropped that decimated the city and killed many of its citizens. The Yamakis and Miyajima both survived, and eventually Hiroshima was rebuilt as the population again began to grow.

When the United States was celebrating it bicentennial in 1976, it was decided that Miyajima would be sent as a gift from the Japanese people to the American people in the hope that they would always live together in peace. And so the resilient Miyajima became known as the tree of peace, and given a place of honor in the National Arboretum in Washington DC. 

This is an interesting fictional autobiography of a single bonsai tree. It is written in the first person from the tree’s perspective, which often doesn’t work but does here. Miyajima tells its story in simple, straightforward narrative. But it is Kazumi Wilds illustrations that really bring Miyajima’s story home. Her soft, gentle illustrations of almost 400 years of careful tending of the bonsai tree are done in a palette of bright greens, bright blues and beige against an essentially white background contrast sharply with the pages of grays and browns depicting the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and destruction it caused. I personally found these illustrations to be as effective than the accompanying text, and may generate a strong emotional response from readers, just as they did from me. It so simply yet clearly demonstrates what happened that terrible day.

The Peace Tree from Hiroshima is an excellent picture book for older readers introducing kids to this particular aspect of World War II and its aftermath. This is Moore’s debut children’s book and she has written a very poignant story with age appropriate themes of friendship, resilience, war, and peace. Moore has also included a glossary, and facts about the different kinds of bonsai, much of which I did not know before I read it.

Be sure to read the Author’s Note at the back to this book. Some facts were altered for the sake of the story, and the Note explains what really happened and why. 

2017 is the 72nd anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima (August 6, 1945) and Nagasaki (August 9, 1945). What better time to read The Peace Tree from Hiroshima, especially now, when talk of using nuclear bombs is being threatened by some of the world’s leaders.  

If you are ever in Washington, DC, you can visit Miyajima at the National Arboretum:

This book is recommended for readers age 8+

This book was purchased for my personal library

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