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A Story with a Tooth-and-Nail Heart This is a beautiful story, told from the perspective of twelve-year old Patty, who is ready to see more than her parents can show her of love, and yes, at her age, of romance. Patty is loveably brave with her tooth-and-nail grit, but Greene never loses sight of the vulnerability of being twelve-years old. There is one awkwardly written scene, in which Anton is a bit too self-congratulatory for really having risked nothing, but overall, this book shows a different kind of Nazi soldier than the stock characters, and it shows heart.
Summer of My German Soldier This book made me cry and cry when I was a kid, maybe 10 or 11 years old. For years, whenever anyone has asked "What's the saddest book you've ever-" I've said "Summer of My German Soldier" before they can even finish the question. My point is that, when I recently picked it up to see how it holds up all these years later, I was predisposed to be moved. That said: I began the book the other day, and didn't stop until I'd reached the end. And I cried and cried and cried. And cried. Let me state for the record that I don't cry easily at books. But this one is devastating. It wasn't like there was one climactic moment that let me get it all out in a cathartic rush; no, it is just quietly brutal from start to finish, in this mounting way, as it unfurls the bleak story of a talkative, unloved girl in a cruel, unloving world. It's the kind of world in which the little flashes of kindness and love actually hurt more than they offer relief. I hadn't remembered it like that. But I guess that's an appropriate way to narrate life in a small town in 1940s Arkansas.
Anyway, this book has definitely ensconced itself in my list of lifetime tearjerkers, along with "The Body" episode of Buffy, and Disney's The Fox and the Hound.I Watched The Movie First and Than Read This Book! Summer Of My German Soldier is an interesting book, I actually watched the movie first and than read the book. This is about Patty a 13 year old Jewish girl growing up in a small southern town during World War II and in this little rural town there is a prisioner of war camp for German POWs and Patty comes from a rotten dysfunctional home in which her cruel father is an abusive drunk who for some reason hates her and is always beating her up and her mother is an uncaring wimp who also hates her but for some reason Patty's parent's love and adore her little sister Sharon and the only love Patty gets is from the family's black housekeeper and than Patty meets an escaped German POW who it turns out was forced into the German Army and hated Hitler and she strikes up a friendship with him and he is kind to her. This is a sad but good book though I have heard that it and the movie are considered to be controversial. The book was turned into a made for TV movie in 1978 and the cast for the movie includes Kristy McNichol as Patty, Bruce Davidson as Anton the escaped POW, Ester Rolle as Ruth the housekeeper, Michael Constantine as Patty's father, Barbara Barrie as Patty's mother and Robin Lively as Patty's little sister Sharon. The movie is available on video and Amazon is offering it though I think it's out of print so you would have to look for used tapes.
