Summer of the War

By Gloria Whelan

Book Overview

It's the summer of 1942. At her grandparents' island cottage in Michigan, 14-year-old Belle excitedly awaits the arrival of her exotic older cousin, Carolyn. Belle's expecting worldly sophistication and French style. But Carolyn brings much more than that: she carries the troubling reality of the World War that is ravaging her home. Turtle Island will never be the same again. Set against the backdrop of breezy island cottages, this heartrending tale from National Book Award medalist Gloria Whelan is the story of a beautiful place and a special friendship-and how events thousands of miles away shaped them both.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060080728
• ISBN13: 9780060080723
• Release Date: August 2006
• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Length: 176 Pages
• Weight: 0.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.3" x 0.7" x 5.5"
• Age Range: 8 to 12 years
• Grade Range: Grades 5 to 9

Customer Reviews

A beautiful tale of family ties and summer traditions

Fourteen-year-old Belle longs for summer; it's when she's free to leave Detroit and return to her family's cottage on Lake Huron. Every summer, she and her siblings participate in the timeless rituals of childhood summers: swimming, fishing, reading, and playing cards in the comfortable cottage they share with their grandparents, sipping lemonade and watching sunsets from the porch. However, the summer of 1942 is different: Belle's cousin Carrie is sent to stay with them. Despite several mentions of pertinent military developments, the story didn't feel dated as WWII (unlike other period novels such as Dream When You're Feeling Blue: A Novel, the 1940s takes a backseat here). Carrie's arrival upsets the delicate family balance. Raised in France and used to getting her own way, Carrie appears spoiled and obsessed with fashion and society. She looks down on Belle's grandmother's cooking and is horrified to discover that there isn't even a movie theater nearby (Belle's is the only cottage on the island). Carrie rebels against the rules that the rest of the family had followed without questioning, until a tragedy forces her to reevaluate. As with other books by Gloria Whelan (The Pathless Woods: Ernest Hemingway's Sixteenth Summer in Northern Michigan (Ernest Hemingway's Great Lakes Connection), Once on This Island (Ramos, Eugenio (Illustrator)), Northern Michigan plays a starring role. There are detailed descriptions of wildlife, particularly birds, and of wildflowers, of channel currents and nautical knowledge. You can practically feel the scorching August sand beneath your toes and hear the echoes of thunder as storms roll over the island. Summer of the War is a delightful read that captures the lazy days of summer despite a changing world.

Exellent Book!

i would recommend this book to anyone even if your older! i think it is very fun to read! im into my second time reading it i liked it so much! i think that if you but this book you will love it! also the front cover of the book is very pretty!

Summer Invasion

In her newest book, Summer of the War, Whelan returns to an island off the coast of her beloved Michigan's upper peninsula, a setting which she explored in The Island Trilogy (Once on this Island, Farewell to the Island, and Return to the Island),except that her new book is set during World War II. When the story opens, the war feels very far away as fourteen year-old Mirabelle and her brother and sisters join their grandparents at the cottage on Turtle Island, just as they have for as long as Belle can remember. For Belle, it's as if time stands still on the island and nothing changes. And, though this year her parents have decided to stay behind in Detroit to help with the war effort, Belle hopes this summer on the island can still offer the same unchanging stretch of time as previous summers. But war inevitably intrudes on her fantasy. It comes to Belle and her family despite the island's remote location and its natural beauty, when they receive a letter announcing the arrival of Belle's older cousin, Caroline. From the moment Carrie steps off the boat onto the island's dock, it's like a bomb exploding, shattering the island's peace and sending sharp and painful reminders of war's destructiveness into the hearts of Belle's family and the islanders who are part of their life on the island. The fragments pierce Belle's heart especially. She had initially looked forward to a summer with a cousin who speaks French and has seen the world. Only her anticipation turns to horror as Carrie shows her disdain for everything to do with her relatives and their provincial life on the island. Belle tries hard to sympathize. But no matter how hard she tries to overlook the mess that Carrie makes in the room that they share, her cousin's rudeness to her friends, and the way her cousin thinks nothing of stealing her best friend, Belle's life on the once-tranquil island only becomes more and more miserable. Belle had longed for a summer of sameness. Now she has to deal with a summer of endless changes, frustration, and disagreeable surprises. Despite the unexpected disruption in their lives, Belle and her family try to observe the same rituals that they've observed every summer. But, nonetheless, Belle feels herself changing, and despises her cousin for bringing change into her life and to the island, which, until this year, had always been a sanctuary of peacefulness. It isn't until Carrie runs off during the night that Belle realizes just how much she is at war with Carrie, and how much Carrie is at war with the family. As much as Belle had hoped the island's remote peacefulness might have protected her from the war, she finally realizes that war has come to the island and touched her, too. But the "war" on the island ends when the mail brings tragic news of Carrie's father. With this news, the entire family-including Carrie-understands that she is now a permanent member of the family in ways that both she and Belle must come to accept. In time, Be