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Summary
Summary
Martin Conway comes from a family filled with heroes and disgraces. His grandfather was a statesman who worked at the US Embassy in London during WWII. His father is an alcoholic who left his family. His sister is an overachieving Ivy League graduate. And Martin? Martin is stuck in between--floundering.
But during the summer after 7th grade, Martin meets a boy who will change his life forever. Jimmy Harker appears one night with a deceptively simple question: Will you help?
Where did this boy come from, with his strange accent and urgent request? Is he a dream? It's the most vivid dream Martin's ever had. And he meets Jimmy again and again--but how can his dreams be set in London during the Blitz? How can he see his own grandather, standing outside the Embassy? How can he wake up with a head full of people and facts and events that he certainly didn't know when he went to sleep--but which turn out to be verifiably real?
The people and the scenes Martin witnesses have a profound effect on him. They become almost more real to him than his waking companions. And he begins to believe that maybe he can help Jimmy. Or maybe that he must help Jimmy, precisely because all logic and reason argue against it.
This is a truly remarkable and deeply affecting novel about fathers and sons, heroes and scapegoats. About finding a way to live with faith and honor and integrity. And about having an answer to the question: What did you do to help?
Reviews (4)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 6-9-Using the literary technique of magical realism, Bloor brings readers a serious tale of justice and redemption, of fathers and sons, of the privileged and the common. John Martin Conway feels out of place at his exclusive prep school, where he is constantly reminded that he is a scholarship kid. After a confrontation with Hank Lowery, the great-grandson of the school's founder, he requests to work at home on an independent study project. The World War II-era radio that his grandmother left him brings him into contact with Jimmy, a boy who lived during the war and who needs his help. He takes Martin back to the time of the London Blitz. In his own time, he focuses his research on the things Jimmy shows him and the people he encounters. Along the way he uncovers some new information about his grandfather's and General Hank Lowery's dealings during the war and discovers how he can help put Jimmy's soul to rest. He also comes to terms with his alcoholic father and with his own depression. Readers will identify with the modern elements of the story and be drawn into the tension of the historical events. Evocative descriptions and elegant phrasings make the writing most enjoyable, and because the author uses a first-person voice, the story seems very personal, and readers will feel Martin's turmoil and angst. Bloor's fans and those who like a little light fantasy with their history will find something intriguing here.-Cheri Dobbs, Detroit Country Day Middle School, Beverly Hills, MI (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Seventeen-year-old Matthew Walsh narrates this account of his tumultuous South Boston childhood with one of literature's most despicable mothers: Nikki is 34 when the book opens pretty, reckless and dangerously manipulative. Through the course of Werlin's (Double Helix) taut story, Matt and his sisters, Callie and Emmy, tiptoe around her mercurial behavior in a calculated effort to survive into adulthood hiding in their rooms when she brings strange men home, saying whatever they believe she wants to hear, doing whatever they must to avoid a violent outburst. The children's father and unmarried aunt know the kids are in danger, but their fear of Nikki outweighs their willingness to act. The novel unfolds as a letter Matt is writing to Emmy as he heads off to college. He possesses the insight of a teen who has rocketed into adulthood out of necessity. If some readers find his maturity implausible, Werlin deflects attention from his nearly dispassionate recollection with short chapters and a thread of palpable tension that will easily carry readers along to the hopeful ending. Ages 12-up. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Kirkus Review
John hates All Souls Preparatory School, where he's tormented by Hank Lowery, great-grandson of General "Hollerin' Hank" Lowery, a WWII hero. Or was he? John's older sister, revising the article on Lowery for her job at an encyclopedia, suspects otherwise. John holds the answer--in a radio bequeathed to him by his grandmother that turns out to be a time-travel device that takes him to the home of a boy named Jimmy in 1940s London. With Jimmy, John observes Lowery at the U.S. Embassy, during the events that precede and follow Jimmy's death. Then he can answer the question Jimmy puts to him: "What did you do to help?" Helping involves a lot of research on Lowery and the Blitz, and a trip to London to find Jimmy's aging father. Sound complicated and unwieldy? Just add overtones of religion (Is Jimmy an angel? What does God want of John?) and alcoholism (John's father) and you've got an ungainly mess. The history and ethics are fascinating but are treated to a shallow ending, and though the characters are compelling, the dropped threads will make readers tune out. (Fiction. 9-13) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Gr. 6-9. When an old radio transports Martin back in time to London during the Blitz, the seventh-grader makes startling discoveries that fuel twin quests: one to expose the unflattering truth behind two World War II heroes casting long shadows in his life, and the other to answer a young Londoner's eerie pleas for help. Every bit as provocative and open-ended as Bloor's Crusader (1999), this genre-defying novel incorporates mysticism steeped in Martin's Catholic faith and a present-day trip to London that connects two troubled father-son relationships across the decades. Bloor demands much of his readers, especially concerning the diplomatic issues leading to U.S. involvement in World War II, and many will have questions about where the facts end and invention begins. Ambitious yet unwieldy, this may work best as a fictional supplement in history classrooms, where it will open discussions of both the slippery qualities of historical truth (Who decides what the real history of a time is? ) and the nature of genuine heroism. --Jennifer Mattson Copyright 2006 Booklist