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Among the big events in history that we study are wars such as World War II or the American Revolution. After we absorb the overall picture, it really helps our understanding to look at the human-level details, the fascinating stories that lie behind the great sweep of events. This is where history comes alive for us. Often this is the domain of historical fiction, where we can learn historical details and get a feel for what the war was like for people like ourselves. In both of the books reviewed below, this same job is done by telling, and telling well, stories that really happened. Both books present their stories in chronological order, which is helpful for the reader’s understanding.
Behind any war, but especially World War II, lie secrets that often come from the action of spies. The book Secrets and Spies: Behind the Scene Stories of World War II, combines stories of both – secrets and spies. In the years after World War II, there were many accounts of events in the war that were published by the men and women who had experienced these events first-hand, both full-length books and magazine articles. Journalists and writers sought out people with relevant experience to share so that they could write their own versions of these events. World War II was so large, taking place across almost all the continents and involving so many millions of people that there was an almost inexhaustible supply of true stories that needed to be told. The magazine Reader’s Digest, founded in 1922, has always had the purpose of collecting the best articles from many other magazines, along with its own original articles, and presenting them to its readers (please just ignore their misguided condensed novels). The book Secrets and Spies: Behind the Scene Stories of World War II collects accounts of secret events that weren’t known to many during the war, along with the action of spies and counter-spies in many aspects of the war. These stories, all published in the Reader’s Digest, are fantastic and thrilling. I thought I knew a lot about World War II before I read this book, and then realized how much I didn’t know! A good middle school reader could handle this book, although it is probably more on a high school reading level.
Brian Kelly, a journalist, historian, and editor, also shows a way that is different from historical fiction to learn about the human aspects of World War II by collecting, from many different sources, true stories about little parts of the war. What he does in his book, Best Little Stories from World War II, is similar to what the Reader’s Digest did in the book reviewed above, but his focus is wider than secrets and spies. He presents fascinating and true “little stories” that are probably not known to most readers. Kelly re-tells them well in an interesting fashion, little but not unimportant things that don’t fit into a one volume overview of an historical period. He often gives some background material to help the reader understand the historical setting of the story. Our ancestors were real people, with real feelings and real thoughts – these little stories help reinforce that assertion. Sometimes humorous, sometimes touching, sometimes dramatic, this is a good high school book to give a human background to World War II. If you don’t have time to read all of it you can select stories of interest using the excellent index. I guarantee that you will not have known about most of these stories!