BOOK REVIEWS
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Where Poppies Grow |
A few years ago, when I was working as Head Teacher of a primary school, a friend bought me a copy of a children's book she had seen in a bookshop and which she thought would find a place in my school's library. It was "In Flanders Fields: the story of the poem by John McCrae" and the author was Linda Granfield.
"Where Poppies Grow" is Linda Granfield's latest book for children on the subject of the Great War.As its subtitle says, it's a World War 1 Companion, and it's a nicely laid-out book which will engage the interst of the young reader and which makes an excellent job of introducing the subject.
Linda Granfield makes extensive use of primary sources which will be of interest to her readers, and every page is beautifully illustrated with photographs of real people, known and unknown, plus documents, postcards home, posters, and various ephemera of the period. Against this layout background, the book mentions all the major aspects which we need to think about when considering the war and its impact - Over the Top; The Trenches; The Air War; The Sea War; Propaganda and Patriotism; Spies and Traitors; A Child's World, and much more. Throughout, Linda Granfield concentrates on what really happened to real people. She returns again and again to the theme that although the war may have been a global one which affected whole nations, it did so by affecting the lives of ordinary people. This is real history. Moreover, the effect the war had on ordinary people is still felt today. And this is real Remembrance.
A very worthy book which will educate young people and - more importantly - a book which will ask them questions and make them think.
Where Poppies Grow
is published by Stoddart Kids, a division of Stoddart Publishing Co.
Limited
Hard Covers
48 pages, many photographs, colour and black-and-white
ISBN: 0-7737-3319-1
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