Historical Fiction

    

     In her historical fiction novel, The War that Saved my Life, author Kimberly Brubaker Bradley tells us the story of Ada, a ten-year-old English girl with a horrific history of physical and emotional abuse and neglect. The tale is set in London and Kent during the second world war, and Bradley accurately incorporates historical references to events such as the evacuation of children from London, the Dunkirk rescue, and the work of the Women’s Voluntary Service. Distinctly British words such as loo, shillings, tea, garden, bloody, and Mam lend credibility to the story, allowing us to authentically experience English culture of the 1940s. Bradley effectively incorporates the unfolding transitions and movements of the war without losing her focus on Ada.

     Ada’s story is heart-breaking. She has been victimized, isolated, ignored, and shamed by her mother for years for a treatable medical condition. Embedded in the story are clear challenges to the religious superstitions of Ada’s England with her brother Jamie’s left-handedness, Ada’s clubfoot, and Susan’s questionable marital status. Yet, The War that Saved my Life is predominantly a story of hope, belonging, and restoration. Ada learns to give with Butter, and she learns to receive with Susan. Both are crucial to the strength that Ada must uncover to release her unfulfilled hopes for her mother’s love and affection. Susan’s transformation parallels Ada’s, communicating a powerful message about healing. At the same time, this tale is also about three frightened individuals creating a new home and family. The seemingly traumatic loss at the end of the novel actually summons a new beginning for the new family.

     Bradley has created an emotionally charged novel. I felt anger, pain, hope, and frustration as I alternately experienced Ada’s mistreatment, tenacity, and resistance to love. Bradley’s characters are complex and multidimensional, and their inconsistencies and failures make them more honest and relatable. The healing that Ada receives is ultimately incomplete until she is faced with a climatic confrontation with Mam. Not until then do we really see the strength and character that has been so unfairly suppressed. Ada draws life from Susan and Jamie, but she also discovers it within herself. So Bradley gives us hope by reminding us of our own power to persevere, to forgive, and to heal. 

     Miss Rumphius, written by Barbara Cooney, tells the story of Alice Rumphius, following her childhood at her grandfather’s knee in a New England seaside town to her return there as an aging woman. Cooney illustrated the story with acrylics and colored pencils, and the pictures are bright and colorful, creating a cheerful mood. The images are also realistic and detailed, allowing us to identify the historical setting of the book through the characters’ attire, the village buildings, and the emergence of an automobile in her later life. Within the story’s theme of beauty, Cooney highlights natural and man-made art with the grandfather’s intricate figureheads, the seasonal seaside views, the fields of lupines, and the landscape paintings in her home. Cooney also uses her illustrations to show the passage of time. We see a young and naive Alice, wondering at her grandfather’s words, a beautiful and composed young woman who is traveling the world, and then an increasingly frail Alice whose hair turns white over several openings.   

     As a child, Alice’s grandfather tells her, “You must do something to make the world more beautiful.” Alice fulfills his directive with the fields of lush lupines after she has traveled and explored the world. But Cooney’s tale is as much about meaning and contentment as creating beauty. It is about identify and acceptance. It is a message about the cycle of life and death. Miss Rumphius’ life is incomplete until she learns to give, and her ability to do so is hindered by her health and age. Yet, she finds a simple way to create and in doing so, she finds her own fulfillment. By the end of the tale, we recognize that Miss Rumphius herself is beautiful, even with white hair and a walking cane. Beauty is nature’s gift to us, and beauty is our gift to one another. Beauty is also making peace with life and death. Cooney shares a fictional tale with lyrical quality that shows us what is truly beautiful. 

Bradley, K.M. (2015). The war that saved my life. New York, New York: Dial Books for Young Readers.

Cooney, B. (1982). Miss Rumphius. New York, New York: The Viking Press.