Eat, Read, and Be Mommy

War Games by Audrey and Akila Couloumbis is my second experience this year with a fiction writer writing a nonfiction family story, and both times the reading was a bit of a struggle for me. To be fair, I’ve never preferred novelized nonfiction, but it also feels like the middle grade fiction writers in question seem a bit stilted when writing something true. I guess it could be just me, but…

Anyway.

War Games is technically co-written by a Newbery Honor winner and her husband, whose story it is; it takes place at the beginning of the Nazi occupation of Greece during WWII. Petros–the character based on Akila Couloumbis–is struggling with typical frustrations, such as wanting his big brother not to treat him like a baby, as well as wartime difficulties, such as destroying or burying everything in their house that would give away the secret that he and his siblings were born in America. When his family learns that a German commander will be coming to board with them, complications abound, especially since returning members of the Greek army keep showing up at their farm. I honestly wonder if I’d have been more captivated by this story were I a boy who related to the things Petros, his cousins, his friends, and his brother do; as it was, it was an interesting story but slow going. I think, though, that if the premise interests you, you should try it yourself rather than take my word for it. If you do, tell me what you think!