The Cold War Era is a period of history I know very little about and is not something which I have often seen featured in children’s fiction. However, there is a steady trickle of books beginning to fill the bookshelves with the aim of bringing to life this slightly neglected era. ‘Sweet Skies’ is certainly one of them, but author Robin Scott-Elliot has written a blog piece highlighting his top historical fiction from the Cold War.
“Berlin, 1948. A city besieged. A boy reaches for the sky.Otto Hartmann would do anything to be a pilot. With Berlin blockaded by the Soviets, the Americans fly to the rescue and Otto’s captivated by the matinee-idol pilots dropping chocolate for the city’s hungry kids. But never mind the Hershey bars – he wants to be up there with them.Now Otto has to choose between those he loves or flying from a ruined city where danger lurks around every corner. And nobody is who they seem, but children are battling to survive in a desperate war-torn city.”
My top 5 historical fiction from the Cold War… by Robin Scott-Elliot
The dramatic background to Sweet Skies is provided by the Berlin Airlift of 1948, the Luftbrucke, the first significant confrontation of the Cold War. It began more than 40 years of a war-that-wasn’t, but if it had been… I may well not have been sitting here writing this, nor you sitting there reading it.
The Week at World’s End by Emma Carroll
The best books are read at speed – because you must get to the end. For me, pace is all important and Emma Carroll is so good at bustling her plots along as she sprinkles period detail, making us feel like we are back in the 1960s while simultaneously being desperate to find out who is poisoning Anna. As someone who writes historical fiction I learn so much from reading Emma, and all the authors on this list.
She captures the tension of a world caught at a moment when the threat of nuclear war had never been greater. And a war that if it did come, in the words of Vie, “would change our world forever, by ending it.”
Watch the best documentaries on the Cuban missile crisis and then read this and you can see how well those few days are captured. People really did fearthe end of the world was coming.
Between Shades of Grey & I Must Betray You by Ruta Sepetys
These are my rules so I’m including two from the brilliant Ruta Sepetys, and two that neatly frame the Cold War.
Between Shades of Grey begins in the Second World War and ends with the Cold War already underway. It’s the story of Lina, a 15-year-old Lithuania, who is taken from her home by Stalin’s soldiers and transported to Siberia along with her brother and mother. Based on real experiences, this is a harrowing story but one always with an element of hope. Lina never gives up and so we never give up on her; there is always something to cling on to. The brutality of her young life is expertly told – there are many novels on the horror of life under Nazi occupation but there are few in English telling of the suffering inflicted by Stalin’s regime. This is an important book – the author’s storytelling flair makesit a compelling one too.
I Must Betray You is set in Budapest in 1989, the year the Cold War effectively ended and Romania was one of the last places to feel the thaw. It’s the story of how the revolution began against one of the most repressive regimes in the Eastern Bloc, seen through the eyes of Cristian, a 17-year-old, who dreams of freedom but instead endures the grim reality of life under the Ceausescus. This is a forgotten corner of history – I remember watching the news of the revolution and the rapid execution of the Ceausescus. But I knew nothing of real life in Romania under a president indulged by the West (he was hosted by the Queen at Buckingham Palace). If the job of the historical novelist is to tell excellent, gripping stories and simultaneously educate by shining lights on history’s darker corners, then Ruta Sepetys has no equal.
When the Wind Blows by Raymond Briggs
I’m not sure I’ve ever been more frightened by a book. As a 12-year-old, I loved being scared reading in bed at night, by say Salem’s Lot by Stephen King – I never volunteered to let the dog out at night after reading that. But this was different. Jim and Hilda Bloggs (a couple you’d love to have as your grandparents) live in a beautiful cottage in the country (a cottage you’d love your grandparents to live in), and they’re preparing for Armageddon. As a 12-year-old I’d seen the leaflets about what to do in case of someone actually pushing The Button, seen the TV adverts… in one ear out the other. I was 12. But this, this was something different. The fact that Briggs’ artwork reminded you of his famous Christmas book only accentuated the quiet horror of reading Jim and Hilda’s story, and its inevitable dire ending.
The Wall Between Us by Dan Smith
I went to the Wall when I was a boy, saw an East German border guard watching me through his binoculars. Built in 1961, it brutally divided Berlin for 28 years and Dan Smith’s story brilliantly captures the moment it first went up, separating friends and family literally overnight. I like to think Dan’s story is the perfect partner to Sweet Skies – and not only because it has a character called Otto(albeit Otto the Cat rather than Otto the wannabe pilot). The Wall followed the airlift as a seminal moment in Berlin’s story. Monika and Anja are friends torn apart by the Wall in a gripping adventure set in a world of mistrust and fear.
Thank you, Robin for the excellent recommendations. I have read a couple of them already but now have some more which I definitely need to track down!
‘Sweet Skies’ is a compelling read for anyone who loves stories with drama, action, and hope…
Jo.
*Many thanks to Everything With Books for inviting me to be a part of this blog tour*
