Publisher's Weekly Review
In writing this wartime memoir, Figes (Patriarchal Attitudes, The Seven Ages revisited the English country town where, as a seven-year-old upper-middle-class Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany, she mingled with street-gangs of girls. The shy, withdrawn foreigner learned about boys, anti-Semitism, the servility of ordinary townsfolk before the local gentry. Living through air raids in an impoverished London suburb and going to school in Cirencester, a once-sleepy town invaded by evacuees and soldiers, Figes matured during the single year (194041) covered in these reminiscences. With hindsight she dissects the benevolent paternalism of the town's provincial elite, who envisioned an England ``where nothing would change once the foreign gangsters were disposed of.'' Her crystal-clear prose and gimlet insights render this narrative a compelling journey through time. (July 21) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Library Journal Review
In Figes's memoirs of her childhood as a German-Jewish refugee evacuated from World War II London to Cirencester, the author employs the voices of the child overwhelmed by her environment and the adult judging those surroundings. Figes presents the year as a happy time, yet Cirencester abounds with snobbery, hostility toward the lower-class evacuees, and anti-Semitism. The citizens seem most concerned that the war inconveniences them; the children at her boarding school suffer from malnutrition. Figes skillfully incorporates the memories of that child, who turns to writing as a way to learn her identity, with her darker adult perceptions. Typical of her style is the incorporation of fascinating historical detail. An enjoyable book, providing insight into the author and the time. Elizabeth Guiney Sandvick, English Dept., North Hennepin Community Coll., Minneapolis (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
