Anne Frank didn’t always live in the annex above her father’s business, hiding away with her family and others from the Nazi’s relentless
pursuit of anyone Jewish.
When she was nearly 11, she and her sister enjoyed walking home together after school, grabbing an ice cream if they weren’t running late, and enjoying their new home in Amsterdam.
They had moved from their home in Germany because of Hitler’s rise to power. Amsterdam welcomed Jewish families with open arms, and many had moved there. Anne is nothing like her older sister Margot. Margot is quiet, obedient and a good daughter. Anne is always in trouble at school for talking in class, bossing her friends about and chatting to boys like she’s always known them.
Her mother is always scolding Anne, but her words roll off Anne as she has the love of her father and grandmother on her side. They both can see how special Anne is, even sending her to a Montessori school where the classes aren’t so rigid.
Anne loves life, the rabbits in the hedges, ice cream, reading and most of all talking. She wants nothing more than to grow up and finally experience all that life has to offer, with new places, faces and a boy to love and love her back.
But even Anne’s positivity begins to wane as news from Germany comes to them in Holland. She overhears muttered conversations between her parents and can feel the world changing around her. Birthdays come and go, and they have less every year, every month, and every week. Whether it be hope, positivity, clothing, food or most important of all to Anne – freedom and the thought of a future.
Ten days before planned, they must flee to a hiding place Anne’s father, mother and business colleagues have prepared for them. A letter has come for one of them to report to the Nazis for travel to a work camp…
The world knows of the book Diary of a Young Girl, where Anne Frank writes her experiences being in hiding from the Nazi Regime. When We Flew Away begins in May 1940, and watches Anne grow up and have her 13th birthday in 1942. Not long after, the family vanish, just like many others before them.
This a beautiful story of a young, vibrant girl, keen to enjoy every moment of life and looking forward to her future, possibly as someone famous. She dreams of California and travelling the world, falling in love and doing all she has ever dreamed. The ever creeping Nazi regime is cleverly portrayed by black moths in Anne’s imagination, encroaching on her peripheral vision and then becoming more and more present.
The point of view does shift from character to character but is mostly clear, giving the reader each family member’s thoughts on their shrinking lives, and worries for one another.
Anne is portrayed to be bright, ahead of her peers in many ways, and far from studious. Her vibrancy often annoys those who want order, including her mother, but Anne’s relationships with her father and grandmother clearly show the love they have for her and her personality.
Although fictional, much of When We Flew Away is based on research undertaken by the author and the support of many historians who guided her in this novel.
Told in five parts clearly marked with dates, there are other important dates and terrible events as part of the narrative, allowing readers to learn more about the plight of the Jewish people in Europe in WWII.
A sobering reminder that we must never forget The Holocaust.
Author – Alice Hoffman
Age – 11+
(2024, Scholastic Aust, Historical, Family, Secret, Love, War, Poverty, Growing up, Grief, Anne Frank, Margot Frank, Edith Frank, Otto Frank, WWII, Amsterdam, Holland, World War 2, Nazis, Jewish, Fear, Hope, Special, Chatterbox, Prejudice, Hate, Soldiers, Cruelty, Holocaust)