Smiling for Strangers

I read this book in four hours. It was compelling to find out how the story would end. I plan to use this book in my English classes as a teaching source. This book about a 14 year-old girl who journeys to safety is encouraging and emotional. I would recommend it to anyone and everyone, as I already have.

A very realistic story of fourteen-year-old Nina, a Yugoslavian girl, living in a village in the war zone. Her parents are dead and her favorite brother is in the army, so she lives with the grandfather, a war vetern, in the village where the family spent every summer. They live with a suitcase always packed. When trouble does come, grandfather tells her to go to the address found on a letter packed away in the attic. It was one of her mother's friends before she was married. Grandfather tells Nina to chose very carefully the people she asks for help and then smile at the stranger. He feels it will be hard for a stranger to ignore Nina smiling and asking for help. Nina's journey to the English address is told with all the confusion typical to a normal fourteen-year-old who is forced to rely on the good will of complete strangers. She relives in her mind the good times with her best friend Anja who was killed and with her family in the happy days before the war. She pretends to be older than her age, but it is her innocence which shines through.A strong, well-written story about a nice quiet teen with the courage to battle her way out of a war zone. A timely book on a country still torn apart by war.

While the reports out of the former Yugoslavia have focused onthe ethnic conflicts, as well they should, the ethnicity of the maincharacter, Nina, is a mystery to the reader. It is an effective plotdevice. It forces us to deal with the war through the eyes of anadolescent, who may or may not understand what's going on. We feel the war through her confusion.All we know is that she is in an awful situation. I think the strength of this book lies in its voice. Although told in the third person, it's through the eyes of Nina that we experience everything. And there are times when Nina is not such a nice person. I really liked this aspect of it. Nina was allowed to remain an ordinary person, with ordinary foibles. She was not made into some saint who could do no wrong purely by dint of her being a victim--although it's very clear that she is a victim. The author does a wonderful job of presenting a well-rounded, real person to us. And the effect is that it makes what happens to her less about the specifics of Yugoslavia and more to do with the fact that it could happen to anyone at any time if the circumstances are such. END