Stone Angel by Jane Yolen
2015; Johns Hopkins University Press; Volume: 68; Issue: 10 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/bcc.2015.0426
ISSN1558-6766
Autores ResumoReviewed by: Stone Angel by Jane Yolen Amy Atkinson Yolen, Jane Stone Angel; illus. by Katie May Green. Philomel, 2015 [40p] ISBN 978-0-399-16741-6 $16.99 Reviewed from galleys Ad 6-9 yrs A young, unnamed Jewish girl finds her tranquil world upended when the Nazis occupy France. The once-friendly baker will no longer sell her or her younger brother croissants, her father loses his job, and the family leaves their home to seek refuge in the forest with other partisans. Certain that angels are guarding [End Page 525] her family, the girl never loses hope that they will all will remain safe, even when Nazi troops pass close by or when climbing through snowy mountains to Spain. The girl’s narration, in ragged right margin prose, describes a resistance experience relatively unexplored in children’s literature, and veteran author Yolen gives her tale attractive smoothness. Indeed, the prettiness of the telling and of the angel imagery (and the girl’s minimal losses) tends to bury the harder truth, as when the narrator “did not cry” at the seeming deaths of her comrades because she “knew they had flown off to be with the angels”; overall, the effect is more fairy tale than slice of relentlessly tragic history. Additionally, the decision to reveal the root of girl’s belief in guardian angels, the titular stone angel on her Parisian building, only at the end makes her belief seem puzzling, and the revelation isn’t climactic enough to atone for its lateness in coming. The mixed-media illustrations at times echo Garth Williams in their rounded lines and gentle shading; the softness cushions the somber subject matter while a subdued palette keeps the mood serious. The girl’s faith is admirable, and this may serve, in context with more factual information, to acquaint audiences with the French partisan and refugee experience. An author’s note in child-friendly language explains the historical basis of the partisans and of the stone angel itself. Copyright © 2015 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois
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