Against a Darkening Sky

This novel, published in 1942, is set in a semi-rural community south of San Francisco in the 1930s. The central character, Mary Perrault, is a Scottish immigrant married to a Swiss gardener. The focus of the novel is on her parenthood and her role as friend and leader in the local community. It's an account of survival in the Great Depression and is shaped by the author's own experience and that of her friends living in the same context.

The author, Janet Lewis (born 17 August 1899), the daughter of a professor of English literature, grew up in Chicago. Her brother, Herbert, served in the army during the First World War. Her first appearances in print were contributions to a high-school literary magazine alongside those of Ernest Hemingway. She studied at the University of Chicago and as a student was an active member of the city's poetry club. Chiefly a poet, her first collection of poems was published in 1922. She had married a fellow poet, Yvor Winters, in 1926 and they moved to California when he was appointed to a position at Stanford. The two ran a literary magazine, which they had founded, from 1929 to 1931. Her first novel appeared in 1932 and she went on to write a further four novels, the most acclaimed of which is the historical novel The Wife of Martin Guerre, published in 1941.

When a friend of the family is killed, the Perraults, even though they have endured hardship, feel unaccustomed to this kind of event:
“Tragedy such as this was unreal to the Perraults, and doubly unreal since it was in the paper. The newsprint gave it, for them, the quality of fiction — something read of, not experienced. They were not able to believe that something so dreaded had actually happened to someone whom they knew. So they watched the papers through the ensuing days...”

All Alone

This children's novel, published in 1953, is set in a small mountain community in the French region of Savoie. The central character, Marcel Mabout, as a ten-year-old boy is sent from the village to the highland pasture to stay with his family's three cattle during the months of summer. The tradition in the village is each man for himself and his father warns him against having anything to do with the other boys looking after cattle in nearby mountain pastures. In his own gently courageous way he brings about a socialist revolution for the village.

The author, Claire Bishop (née Huchet, born 30 December 1898), was born in Geneva. She studied at the Sorbonne in Paris but dropped out of university to pursue hr interest in storytelling. In 1924, she opened France’s first library for children. After she married Frank Bishop, an American pianist, she moved to New York City. There she oversaw the children’s reading room of the city’s public library. Her first book for children was published in 1938 and more than 20 further books were published. Two of her books were shortlisted for the Newbery Medal: Pancake-Paris (1948) and this book.

Marcel, the young hero of the story, tells his fellow herdboy Pierre that he wants to change the behaviour of the people of the village:
“When I'm a man, I'll say to everybody in Monestier, ‘Let's do everything all together!’  He opened his arms wide in a large gesture.”
His actions convince the people:
“We began to see that there is a better way of life than each man for himself and the state for all. We began to see that if we would get together of our own accord, life might be better in Monestier.”

Bugles in the Afternoon

This historical novel, published in 1943, is set in Montana. It's an account of the devastating outcome for General George Custer's 7th Cavalry Regiment at the Battle of Little Bighorn. The background to the battle is described from the perspective of Lieutenant Kern Shafter and his one-time friend and now bitter adversary Edward Garnett. The high level of casualties due to the inept overconfidence of a general is viewed in the aftermath of the trench warfare of the First World War.

The author, Ernest Haycox (born 1 October 1899), grew up in Portland, Oregon. At the age of 16, he joined the army and served on the Mexican border in a campaign against the forces of Pancho Villa. When the United States entered the First World War, he went with the 162nd Infantry to the Western Front and served as a rifle instructor and military policeman. After the war, he studied journalism in the University of Oregon. From 1924 to 1926 he lived in New York City where he became deeply interested in the American Revolution. He made several trips to battlefields in New England and wrote eight stories and two novellas set during that era. Returning to Oregon in 1926, he decided to concentrated on writing Westerns. He went on to write more than 20 novels and numerous short stories. Several of his works were the basis of well-known films in this genre, most notable of which is Stagecoach.

Some of the scenes in the Battle of Little Bighorn resemble those of the trench warfare of the First World War:
“Bullets whipped by and scraped up flinty showers of earth. Shafter breathed from the bottom of his lungs; he heard men from the higher parapet call him forward. He reached the top and half turned to look behind him and at that moment he was struck hard in the body and he dropped to his hands and knees and was puzzled at his fall. He started to rise again and saw Lieutenant Edgerly striding toward him. He reached out for Edgerly’s hand but his own arm grew too heavy and fell back.”

The Compass Points North

This children's novel, published in 1938, is set on the English-Scottish border. It featured the same Dorset siblings (Jane, Oliver and Bill Lockett) that were introduced in her 1936 novel August Adventure. The premise of this novel is that another group of children (Fenella, Podge, Edward and Pip) are on a camping holiday on the English-Scottish border. The setting prompts an idea of a role-playing border skirmish between the Ancient Britons and the combined Picts and Scots. Being on the southern side of the frontier, they think of themselves as the Ancient Britons but long to have an ‘enemy’ to play with. Then the Lockett children arrive on the Scottish side to stay with twins Morwenna and Esme Vardon. Battle commences soon after.

The author, Mary Evelyn Atkinson (born 20 June 1899), was born in London. Her father was a schoolmaster and by 1911, his work had taken the family to Swanage, Dorset. She was educated at Leeson House, a local boarding school for girls. Her brother, Geoffrey, was killed in action in February 1917 while serving with the Indian Army in Kut, Iraq. Her first children's book was published in 1936 and a further 13 novels about the Lockett children were published in the following 25 years. In addition, she wrote a shorter series of novels about a pony called Fricka, as well as short stories. She had started her career as an author with the publication of a play in 1931 and five further one-act plays were published in the 1930s.

One of the children is taken prisoner and when released, he returns to his camp to report that “they said it was to be a war”. Jane respons to the news with determination: “They'll get ‘war’ all right! We'll avenge you. Trust us! They’d better look out.” Later Jane after a success in the battlefield reflects “what a pity it was that, not being a boy, she could not become a soldier and lead real men to victory. There was Boadicea, of course, but women didn't seem to do that sort of thing nowadays.”

Barrie & Daughter

This coming-of-age novel, published in 1943, is set in rural Kentucky in the early twentieth century. It is inspired by her own upbringing in the northeast of the state. The central character, Fern Barrie, the eldest daughter of her family, has no desire to choose either of the options her mother has in mind for her adult life: housewife or teacher. When her father decides to set up a store for the local community in competition with a store that was trading unfairly, she wants to be involved in running it. She is at the forefront of building up the business while wisely handling the conflict with the hot-headed, gun-toting owner of the rival store.

The author, Rebecca Caudill (born 2 February 1899) grew up in Harlan County in northeast Kentucky. She studied at Wesleyan College in Macon, Georgia and afterwards began work as a high-school teacher. She lived most of her adult life in Urbana, Illinois. Her first book (this one) was published in 1943. Her 1949 novel Tree of Freedom, about the War of Independence, was shortlisted for the Newberry Award, while A Pocketful of Cricket was shortlisted for the Caldecott Medal in 1964. She wrote 18 books for children and several works of non-fiction, including the memoir My Appalachia. There is an annual young readers book award in Illinois named in her honour.

The later chapters of the novel are mostly concerned with the local rivalry surrounding the election (see the illustration above). The central character belongs to one of very few Democrat families in the community. He faces threats to his life from hotheaded Republicans but maintains a pacifist stance:
“I put no trust in guns... An honest education's the only defense a democracy needs, or can rightfully use, for that matter.” The author recalled in her memoir the election day atmosphere of her childhood:
“drinking, quarrelling, shooting, feuding, and generally disturbing the peace”.

I Go by Sea, I Go by Land

This novel, published in 1941, is set in England and the United States during the Second World War. It takes the form of a diary of Sabrina, the 11-year-old daughter of an English airman, who, with her younger brother, is evacuated from the family home in Sussex to stay with her aunt in New England. On hearing that their small village had been bombed, their aunt Harriet had sent a telegram: “Send children at once. Would be so delighted. Sure it is wisest.”

The author, P.L. Travers (née Lyndon Goff, born 9 August 1899), spent her early childhood in Queensland. On the death of her father in 1907, the family moved to Bowral, New South Wales. She was educated at a boarding school in Sydney. She began writing poetry and her first poems were published while she was a teenager. After leaving school, she worked for a time as an actor and dancer. She moved to England in 1924. In 1933, she began to write the book that was to make her famous — Mary Poppins. It was published the following year and she went on to write numerous books about the character.She also wrote several other novels, further poetry, a play and a few works of non-fiction.

Sabrina, the central character, describes her leave-taking from her father very much from her father's perspective:
“He took James and me and held us tightly to his sides. I could feel the bones in his leg and the bones in his arm. He looked at us for a long time as though he were remembering every bit of our faces... He said ‘Sabrina and James, there are two things that are more important than any others — Love and Courage. Will you remember?’ He said if we kept that in our minds our going to America would be easy. He said that it would be a weight off his mind to have us there while he was fighting. And that he would take care of Mother for us and as soon as the war was over we would be all together again.”

Bird of the Wilderness

This impressive coming-of-age novel, published in 1941, has the unusual setting of a German-American small town during the First World War. The small town called Parkerton is based on the the the Illinois town of Pana, where the author grew up. The central character, Bill, is the teenaged son of a Dresden-born mother, who teaches music to the children of the town's leading families, and an absent Welsh father. Bill has no sympathy for his uncle's blinkered pro-German patriotism and longs for the day when he can escape small-town life and join the army.

The author, Vincent Sheean (born 5 December 1899), was brought up in Illinois. He went to the University of Chicago and interrupted his studies in 1918 to join the army with a view to serving in Europe. He was disappointed when the armistice came: “I was sorry when the war ended... There were millions of us, young Americans between the ages of 15 or 16 and 18 or 19, who cursed freely all through the middle weeks of November. We felt cheated. We had been put into uniform with the definite promise that we were to be trained as officers and sent to France.” He returned to university in March 1919. On the death of his mother the following year, he moved to New York to start a career in journalism. In 1922 he moved to France to work for the Chicago Tribune, travelling widely as one of its foreign correspondents. In addition to his reporting, he wrote works of fiction, biography and memoir. He wrote a young autobiography called Personal History as he observed the rise of fascism in Europe. It was later adapted into an Alfred Hitchcock film.

There is a rising conflict for Bill Owen, the central character, between his German parentage and his American upbringing. His mother, Louisa, "was filled with foreboding; the year was 1916 and two of her brothers and no fewer than seven nephews were in Germany; she had produced an alien son in a strange land, and although the land was also hers... the growth of her son was setting her apart from it...”
Bill talks about his mother's native country as a detached foreigner:
“The Germans are killing Americans all the time, sinking our ships, insulting us every day, and that Wilson does nothing at all about it except send notes and notes and notes.”