'Hitlers Daughter'
A novel by Jackie French
Title Hitlers Daughter
Author Jackie French
Publisher HarperCollinsPublishers
Year 1999
Genre Teen fiction
Hitlers Daughter won the children's book council, book of the year for young readers in 2000. The author Jackie French has been writing for a span of ten years, during this time she has written over 80 books for children and adults. Jackie French's love for history started as a child, this is where her inspiration for her stories originated.
Hitlers Daughter is a story about war and humanity. It is set in both WWII Germany and current Australia. The story is about a group of modern Australian children playing 'The Game'. The Game is an activity in which the characters tell stories about different topics. The children, Anna, Mark, Ben and Tracy decide that it's Anna's turn to tell her story.
Anna tells a story about the life as hitlers daughter, Heidi. Heidi is a young girl who is raised by her tutor fräulein Gelber. Heidi's father Hitler often visited her, but not for very long. Sometimes hitler would send Heidi dolls with beautiful long blond hair and blue eyes ,but secretly Heidi hated them because they were everything she was not.
Mark takes a lot of interest in Anna's story, this is why he is a major character in this book. Mark is a sensitive boy who enjoys The Game. Mark learns about many issues such as racism and parent-child relationships as he compares his life to Heidi's. mark becomes troubled by the story of Heidi and starts to question whether his parents are always right. Mark becomes so engaged in the story that he wonders whether Heidi is real or not.
This novel is a wonderful book, it was written very well. I think the highlights of the story is the times when mark would ask an adults a question because I makes you wonder how you would answer it. The characters were described very well and I felt like I could relate to each of them. I recommend this...