SuitabookThe Machine Gunners
Robert Westall
- Reading
- Read alongside the child, pausing after the gun is found, after Rudi is detained and after the final confrontation. Discuss what the characters know at each point before judging their choices.
- Themes
- Children and power: The children find a machine gun, establish a fortress and use force while trying to manage the consequences. The book leaves its stance open to more than one reading.
- Enemy and individual: The children detain German airman Rudi and later encounter him through negotiation and attempted escape. The book leaves its stance open to more than one reading.
- War seen through childhood: The novel draws on the author's experience as a boy during the Second World War and follows children amid raids and military danger. It offers a child-centred perspective on wartime life, combining remembered experience with invented adventure rather than presenting a straightforward historical account.
- Worth knowing
- Some families may wish to prepare for bombing, a crashed aircraft, a functioning machine gun, a child’s presumed death, captivity, shooting and injury. The author also acknowledges swearing.