Soldier Doll (2014)

Soldier Doll. Jennifer Gold. 2014. Second Story Press. 256 pages. [Source: Review copy]

Soldier Doll is a message-driven novel with an interesting premise. Towards the end of World War I (1918), Margaret Merriweather, an English woman, gives her fiance a wooden doll. This is a doll that her own father made for her when she's a child. She paints a soldier's uniform on him. She gives him as a good luck charm, a way he can carry her with him wherever he goes. After he dies, Margaret is inspired to write a poem. This poem becomes famous. The doll itself is gone forever. Or so everyone thought. Soldier Doll follows the adventures of this wooden soldier with the baby-face. The framework for all the stories is his being discovered in Toronto in 2007 by a teen girl, Elizabeth. Elizabeth is buying her dad a DOLL for his birthday. Her dad is a soldier preparing to go to Afghanistan. A moping Elizabeth ventures into a used bookstore and discovers the poem-book by Merriweather. She's convinced she's found THE DOLL from the poem. She and her Dad team up to see if this is so... (view spoiler)

The chapters alternate between the 2007 story and the doll's adventures in the past beginning with World War I. The doll also heads to other wars: World War II, Vietnam, and the Iraq War. His ownership is passed along many times. I should clarify that readers don't get the perspective of the doll at any time. It remains just an object. What readers do get are glimpses of various soldiers from various countries. It captures scenes from life on the front.

War. War. War. That is the focus of Soldier Doll. Why do nations go to war? Why do men go to war? What is the point of it all? Those are the questions asked openly and honestly in Jennifer Gold's Soldier Doll. It is an anti-war novel, as you might imagine.

I found the 2007 story to be awkward. I found the past stories to be much better. The past sections were written in past tense. The 2007 story was written in very awkward present tense. It was third person present.
© 2014 Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews

Yesterday's Dead (MG)

Yesterday's Dead. Pat Bourke. 2012. Second Story Press. 232 pages.

I enjoyed this historical children's book set during the 1918-1919 influenza epidemic. It is set in Canada, in Toronto. The narrator, Meredith, is thirteen pretending to be fifteen or sixteen. Her family needs the money, so she has dropped out of school and taken a job as a maid in a wealthier family, a doctor's family. She's just learning her place when the flu reaches the household, soon her 'simple' job as a maid has become much, much more. People are depending on her, and, of course, all she can do is her best, but Meredith is forced to grow up quickly in a way. The book just covers a brief span of time, but it is still an intense read. I definitely would recommend this one!

 Read Yesterday's Dead

• If you enjoy historical fiction
• If you enjoy children's books
• If you are interested in books set during this time period (World War I)

© 2012 Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews

The Last River Child

The Last River Child. Lori Ann Bloomfield. 2010. Second Story Press. 280 pages.

Every child in the village of Walvern is told this story...

The Last River Child is such a compelling story. Set in Canada during World War I, it tells the story of an (often) unhappy family. Our heroine, Peg, is rumored to be 'the river child.' Which in this small-minded, oh-so-superstitious community is bad news indeed. Her mother, while alive, fought for her child. She hated the community who would make her daughter, her baby, an outcast. Unfortunately, on the very day that war is declared, Peg's mother dies. And life for Peg and her sister, her older sister, Sarah, is never quite the same. Their father, who had his difficult moments even when his wife lived, becomes angry, bitter, depressed. More and more the girls notice their father drinking his troubles away. (Of course, that isn't a lasting solution. It leads to problem of its own.)

Peg was a heroine that I could love. And this community--though far from perfect--was one that I could appreciate. The drama is a family one in many ways. Exploring the complicated relationships between family members--especially between siblings. I also liked learning the story of Peg's mother, Rose. Readers also see the impact of war on a family, on a small community. I loved reading this book. It was so well-written. The characters were so human that you couldn't help feeling for them. I couldn't put this one down. It was just that good.

© Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews