The Price of War

Anna and the Swallow Man by Gavriel Savit

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


In a perfect world, a seven-year-old child would have a mother, a father, and a home. He or she would have plenty to eat and friends to play with in the magical land of childhood. Unfortunately, we live in a less than perfect world, where men fight one another, where children sometimes are left to struggle for survival on their own. This is the world of seven-year-old Anna Lania in Author Gavriel Savit’s novel ANNA AND THE SWALLOW MAN.

The year is 1939. Anna and her father live in Krakow. Poland is occupied by the Germans. The day her world changes, her seventh birthday, Anna’s father, a professor at the university, has to attend a lecture. She never sees him again.

Anna’s story is a story of survival. It’s a story of friendship and trust. When she meets Swallow Man, they become a family, of sorts. Hunger, fear, and doubts travel with them as they wander from place to place, trying to keep out of sight of those who would kill them. When they meet Hirschl, new problems arise because he’s different.

ANNA AND THE SWALLOW MAN is a beautiful yet sad novel that will bring tears to your eyes, at least it did to mine. I so wanted good things for them, but the times they lived in were difficult for all. Anna is a precious child. The author makes her so real you care what happens to her. The Swallow Man is different, strange in some ways, but he truly cares for Anna, though he has his own way of showing it. And Hirschl is a character I’ll always remember. They made the best of their lives. I wonder if I could do the same.

This would make a good addition to high school libraries and classrooms, as well as public libraries and your own, to remind us of the good times we live in. Maybe we should be more thankful and complain less about our lives.

The publisher provided me with an ARC of the novel for my honest review.
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