Stay Where You Are and Then Leave, by John Boyne

I just read John Boyne's newest historical fiction novel on Netgalley. I didn't find it quite as captivating as his earlier The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, but I still really enjoyed the novel and Boyne's lyrical writing style.

Stay Where You Are and Then Leave is about a boy named Alfie and his family's experiences as his father, Georgie, enlists in the army to fight in World War I. Alfie and his mother, Margie, are left alone in London to fend for themselves, and their entire world changes quickly after Georgie leaves. Margie finds herself having to get a job, Alfie notices that attendance at school is no longer enforced, and neighbors begin to disappear. Alfie looks forward to the regular letters from his father, until they stop coming. Alfie is convinced that his father has died, but his mother insists he's on a "secret mission". Alfie soon learns the truth, and the novel takes a turn into examining post-traumatic stress disorder, before it was given that name.


I thought it was really interesting to examine PTSD through the lens of World War I, because you hear about it so often right now with soldiers returning from the Middle East. I was also amazed, again, at Boyne's ability to capture the voice of a child, and thought the narrative was very age-appropriate.

Publication Date: March 25, 2014

The Impossible Knife of Memory, by Laurie Halse Anderson

I loved The Impossible Knife of Memory, by Laurie Halse Anderson, from the very first page. The novel opens:

“It  started in detention. No surprise there, right? Detention was invented by the same idiots who dreamed up the time-out corner. Does being forced to sit in time-out ever make little kids stop putting cats in the dishwasher or drawing on white walls with purple marker? Of course not. It teaches them to be sneaky and guarantees that when they get to high school they’ll love detention because it’s a great place to sleep.”

Halse Anderson is just so adept at capturing the teenage psyche and perpetuating it in the voice of her characters. I loved this about her last books and she lived up to my expectation in this one!

The Impossible Knife of Memory is about Hayley Kincain, whose mother is dead and whose father has recently returned from deployment. Suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, Hayley’s dad has a hard time settling down and keeping a job; for this reason, they set out on cross-country trucking jobs, and Hayley is very loosely homeschooled. However, during her senior year, her dad decides it’s time for her to have a normal life and go to a real high school. So, they move back to the town where her dad grew up, into his mother’s old house, and Hayley begins her “normal” life. But, there’s nothing normal about having a dad who is fired more than he works, screams from nightmares in the middle of the night, and wavers between euphoria and depression. Hayley can’t focus on her schoolwork because she’s so worried about her dad. While attempting to avoid making friends, Haley eventually finds someone who can help her deal with her dad's situation. Will she be able to cope before her dad gets even worse?

This was an awesome book, but there were some sex scenes and inappropriate language, so I'd only recommend it for mature readers.