SuitabookResist
Tom Palmer
- Reading
- Read alongside the child rather than rushing through the tense sections. Pause after danger, hunger or family separation, checking how the scene feels and distinguishing historical understanding from admiration for risk-taking.
- Themes
- Courage under occupation: Edda continues helping the resistance despite terror and increasingly dangerous circumstances. Courage is presented as acting while afraid, with attention to determination and the protection of others.
- Ordinary life under oppression: Food and resources are scarce, arrest and forced labour threaten ordinary people, and families and communities experience separation and hardship. The occupation and Nazi oppression are depicted as causing misery, fear and deprivation rather than as neutral background.
- History through a personal story: The novel is inspired by Audrey Hepburn’s teenage experiences and uses Edda’s story to explore Dutch resistance during the Second World War. It offers a personal route into historical circumstances while drawing on real experiences and people.
- Worth knowing
- Expect emotionally difficult wartime material: Nazi occupation, arrest and forced labour, a murdered uncle, a captured brother, hunger and near-starvation, hiding, bombing, frightened families and people fleeing their homes.