Tasks for International Human Rights Day: Post a picture of yourself next to a war memorial or other memorial to an event pertaining to Human Rights. (Pictures of just the memorial are ok too.)

 

Anógia village, Crete: the Andartis (resistance fighter) monument near the museum to the village's destruction in WWII.

Crete was occupied by the German military in the 1940s, fierce resistance by the local population notwithstanding. During one particularly memorable episode (later the subject of a book and a movie both titled Ill Met by Moonlight), a joint group of Cretan resistance fighters and British intelligence operatives, led by Major (and writer-to-be) Patrick Leigh Fermor -- in the movie, portrayed by Dirk Bogarde -- and Captain W. Stanley Moss (author of the book Ill Met by Moonlight), abducted German Major General Heinrich Kreipe near his home in Heraklion and marched him all the way across the Psiloritis mountains to the south coast of Crete, from where he was eventually shipped off to Egypt. He spent the rest of WWII in a British POW camp.

Patrick Leigh Fermor's evocative account of their struggle across the slopes of Mount Ida has come to particular fame for its "Horace Moment" -- his trademark poetic description of the moment when he and the German general realized that they had both enjoyed the same sort of profoundly formative, classical humanistic education and, as a result, had come to share the same values. Here it is, as taken from a Report written for the Imperial War Museum in 1969 and as published in Words of Mercury (2010):

"Everything ahead was a looming wilderness of peaks and canyons, and in the rougher bits it would be impossible for a large party to keep formation, or even contact, except at a slow crawl wich could be heard and seen for miles. The whole massif was riddled with clefts and grottoes to hide in. We must all vanish into thin air and let the enemy draw a total blank. [...]

We woke up among the rocks, just as a brilliant dawn was breaking over the crest of Mount Ida which we had been struggling across for two days. We were all three [i.e., Stanley Moss, Leigh Fermor, and their captive] lying smoking in silence, when the General, half to himself, slowly said:

'Vides ut alta stet nive candidum
Soracte ...' **

I was in luck. It is the opening line of one of the few odes of Horace I know by heart (Ad Thaliarchum, LIX). I went on reciting where he had broken off:

'... Nec iam sustineant onus
Silvae laborentes, geluque,
Flumina constiterint acuto' **

and so on, through the remaining five stanzas to the end.

The General's blue eyes swivelled away from the mountain-top to mine -- and when I'd finished, after a long silence, he said: 'Ach so, Herr Major!'*** It was very strange. 'Ja, Herr General.' As though, for a long moment, the war had ceased to exist. We had both drunk at the same fountains long before, and things were different between us for the rest of our time together."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

 

 

Leigh Fermor unfortunately doesn't mention, however -- at least, in the published version of his account -- that inter alia by way of retribution for Kreipe's abduction, as well as in retribution for a number of other acts of resistance, the German military, later in 1944, annihilated the entire village of Anógia (from where the group had embarked on their climb across the mountains), killing every single one of its several 100 souls and reducing the whole village to ashes. It was only in 2009 (65 years later), after having lived there for a number of years and slowly gained the population's trust, that German artist Karina Raeck was able to take a major step towards reconciliation by opening a museum commemorating the village's destruction and by creating, together with the village population, a large artistic display in memory of its resistance fighters on the Nida Plain above the village; likewise entitled "Andartis."

 

Anógia after its 1944 destruction by the German military.

 

The "Andartis" monument on the Nida Plain, created by artist Karina Raeck and the villagers of Anógia in 2009.

 

This was kind of a hard book to review, mostly because it almost falls between genres. It's classed as an upper Middle-Grade historical fantasy, which, that's not wrong . . .

 

I felt like it had more of a classic children's fiction feel to it. It's coming-of-age, and also a sort of epic hero's journey, straddling children's lit and YA in a way that's often done more by adult literary works. It touches on many 'big ideas': deformity, religion/society, acceptance, adoption, trauma, bullying, disability, purpose/identity, fate . . . The format is creative and unique. The story arc stretches from the MC's birth to age 14 and is told in omniscient third person varying with passages in verse.

 

I'm not sure if there was a meaning to the alternating styles; at some points, I thought the dreamlike verse passages were meant to show the MC's perspective in a closer, almost experiential or sensory format as an infant, a toddler, a mute child . . . but then that didn't necessarily carry through, so perhaps it was more to craft an atmosphere for the story.

 

The setting is the ancient Mediterranean, and the story picks up on legends of bull dancing. The world feels distinct, grounded and natural, without heavy-handed world-building. It's a world of gods and priestesses, sacrifice and death and surrender. Humans seem very small within it, and as a children's book, it's challenging rather than comforting. There's death and violence and loss, handled in a very matter-of-fact manner, so I'd recommend it for maybe ages 10+, depending on the child. It's not gratuitously violent or graphic, but it's a raw-edged ancient world where killing a deformed child, having pets eaten by wild animals, beating slaves - including children - and sacrificing people as well as animals to the gods is just part of life. 

 

I was very kindly sent a hardcover edition via the Goodreads Giveaways program, and the book production is lovely. It has a bold, graphic cover with some nice foil accents, a printed board cover (which I prefer for kids books due to the durability), fully illustrated internal section pages, and pleasant, spacious typesetting.

 

Confident, mature young readers will find this an engaging, challenging and meaningful read with an inspiring story arc and some lovely writing. Hesitant readers and very young readers will probably find it a struggle. I'd give it 5/5 as a product, 4/5 as a literary work and 3/5 as kid's entertainment.

This beautifully written, utterly charming romantic thriller kept my heart pounding in terrified suspense, even though my original copy of the book is falling apart because I’ve read the story so many times. When I was twelve or thirteen, Mary Stewart was a favorite author of everyone I knew who loved to read--my mother, her friends, me, and eventually my younger sisters--and of all Stewart’s books it was The Moon-Spinners that siren-called me back to its pages again and again.

 

Nicola Ferris is on holiday in Crete, surrounded by age-old ruins, sunny skies, and colorful wildflowers. While hiking among fragrant lemon groves on the craggy hills of the White Mountains, she impulsively follows the path of flying egret and runs into an Englishman who’s been shot, yet won’t tell her what happened and just wants her to go away and forget she ever saw him, though he obviously needs help. But as Nicola continues her vacation, enjoying the beautiful scenery and relaxing with her cousin, she can’t help noticing details that draw her back to the mystery and into danger.

 

I’m not normally a reader who enjoys a lot of description in books, but in The Moon-Spinners it’s so gorgeous and transporting I relish every word and image. While the story is set firmly and very compellingly in the all-too-real world, Stewart’s writing is laced with ancient myths and literary allusions.  

 

The novel was written in the early 1960’s and Nicola shares some of the attitudes of that era, a time when men were leaders, male superiority was casually accepted by just about everyone, and the ideal for women was to be safely put up on a pedestal, but Nicola strains against those strictures too because she’s observant, quick-witted, and independent. It had been decades since my last reading, and delving back into The Moon-Spinners was like going on an archaeological dig through layers of my own worldview, helping me remember, even re-feel, some of my earliest understandings of life and love and the kind of person I wanted to be, since I was brought up surrounded by those early 60’s assumptions too, before everything started changing just a few years later in the decade.

Thank you to the publishers for providing this book in exchange for an honest review. This did not alter my review in any way.

I feel like when I read I am constantly learning something. This is even more true when I read historical non-fiction. I would consider myself pretty learned on World War 2, my dad being pretty much an amateur historian on the subject, but I didn’t know about Crete’s part in the war, how it was used as a German base and how the Cretan people fought back, built a resistance with the help of some dedicated Brits and then kidnapped a Nazi general from practically outside his house.

The courage and dedication of the Cretan people during the war was outstanding to read. Rick Stroud really brought to life all the key players in the saga, even the abducted general Kreipe, and the Cretan people stood out to me in their quest to protect their homeland. They weren’t going to submit quietly to the Germans even as their threats and devastating actions against the locals increased, but kept building the guerrilla resistance with each Cretan helping out in any way they could, no matter what the repercussions could possibly be.

The writing did, in places, get a little bogged down in details and I found it best and easiest to read when I had absolutely no distractions and enough time to really immerse myself in the narrative. Then I found myself really involved with firstly the set up of what’s happening on Crete at the time of the war (REALLY essential to understanding what happens later on), the characters – real people who actually existed, and the complexity of the plan for the kidnapping of General Kreipe. It’s been argued over the years since whether the kidnapping really achieved anything, but it was the moral booster for the Cretan people (over 400 were involved in the entire operation!) and was considered to be worth the trouble. Stroud explores all details surrounding the kidnap and what came after with clarity and honesty, incorporating multiple primary sources into his research, and leaves it up to the reader to decide what part this kidnap plays in World War 2 history. I was fascinated by the whole affair and in awe of what was accomplished in the rugged mountains of Crete by everyday men who became heroes.

I really enjoyed this read but I also found it easy to put down and leave for a day or two before I felt compelled to go back to it. I found myself reading only small amounts at a time even when I wanted to read more. But it is a fascinating part of World War 2 history and definitely worth the read. Three and a half stars.

Beevor, famed historian of the 1998 [b:Stalingrad|542389|Stalingrad The Fateful Siege, 1942-1943|Antony Beevor|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1348217283s/542389.jpg|42137] and the 2002 [b:The Fall of Berlin|42661|The Fall of Berlin 1945|Antony Beevor|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1312049741s/42661.jpg|300328], which awakened the world to the Red Army's war rapes in Germany in 1945, was still in 1991 struggling a little bit to find his meter, and although this book offers some very professional and sharp passages, on the other hand the bar has been set higher by his later accomplishments and this 11 day battle lacks some of the horrific grandeur of Stalingrad or Berlin. (total casualties on both sides ~6000-- which is about how many died or were wounded every twelve hours in Stalingrad for five months)

there are some very airy and nice descriptions of 'old world' britain with its winchester graduates and eccentric counts and barons carrying out war according to their ancient traditions, but otherwise this is a mere competent work.