Allies by Alan Gratz (Juvenile Historical Fiction)

 

Summary

Set in D-Day, June6, 1944, this text highlights the lives of Dee Carpenter, an underage United States Army private who heads for Omaha Beach in a quest to seek revenge for an uncle who was captured by Nazis when he was a little boy, and Samira Zidano, an eleven-year-old French-Algerian girl who is seeking the French resistance and goes on a quest in rescuing her captured mother.

Justification 

The author, Alan Gratz is a New York Times Bestselling author of other highly-acclaimed historical fiction books. His 2018 book, Refugee was a Bluebonnet and Lone Star  Award-winning book. The text also received favorable reviews from Publishers' Weekly and Booklist.

Presenting Multiple Perspectives

This text is considered to be a historical fiction book. One unique ability that author, Alan Gratz has is being able to create characters who are from different eras experiencing the effects of different historical events and tying together the commonalities of their struggles throughout the book through presenting parallel situations. This was particularly present in his book Refugee (2018). He follows a similar pattern with this text, except he chose to center the perspectives of different characters in relation to a particular event set within World War II. The reader gets to visualize the perspective of American soldiers, the French, and the African-American soldier perspective with the incorporation of a black army medic named Henry.

Through the Eyes of a Young Protagonist

According to Children's Literature, Briefly, "young readers are accosted with a study of history that generally ignores the people who aren't historically famous--people like themselves--almost no children are ever mentioned" (Young & Bryan, 2020). This is why having a young protagonist present in a juvenile historical fiction text is important. The main protagonist of the text is Dee Carpenter (who was actually born German), but the reader also gets a glimpse of Samira Zidano, the French-Algerian girl who is desperate to get the word out that an invasion is set to take place.

History Not Being Sugar Coated

Children's Literature, Briefly also states that, "indeed, much of our history is unsavory. But the lessons history has to teach us will go unlearned if we are forever softening the factual account" (Young & Bryan, 2020). Although the text is a juvenile historical fiction book (particularly aimed toward those in Grades 3-6), Gratz does not hold back in presenting an accurate depiction of the hardships and turmoil that were experienced by the soldiers fighting in World War II. The reader also receives a glimpse of how the Nazi rule tore many families apart.

Citation

Gratz, Alan. (2019). Allies. Scholastic Press.

 

Reference 

 

Young, T. & Bryan, G (2020). Children's literature, briefly. Pearson.