When the Sky Falls

Product Information

The story opens in a train station where children are being evacuated to the countryside, except Joseph who is being sent to the city by his grandmother. An unlikely friendship develops out of need for teamwork between Joseph and his guardian Mrs F, who is in charge of the city zoo. Joseph is an unhappy lad who is missing his father fighting in the war and unable to comprehend why his mother left him. A heartwarming story about the value of friendship and trust. In which love plays an important role. Behind every anger hides deep-seated sadness and that's a big life lesson that Joseph needs to learn. His grandmother, who is his caretaker, reaches a point where she can no longer handle Joseph's behavior. His new caretaker then is Mrs F. The direct and grumpy character of Mrs F. causes Joseph to strongly resist against her.

I think Joseph was relatable and that made him more likeable; the way he struggled with his dyslexia and no one believed him evoked sympathy from the reader. The way his family was split up was also sad as his mother had seemingly suffered depression and his father was shot in the war. Although situations like this would have been common at the time, it is interesting to see how it affects Joseph and leads to him closing himself off from all others apart from Adonis. I loved seeing Joseph realise that Adonis thinks, feels and acts in an almost-human way yet he does not reject Joseph like (in his opinion) real people in his life.

Publisher

This is a beautifully written historical adventure story that will take readers on a very emotional and exciting journey. The pace is fast and the feelings run high. The reader ends up fighting for Joseph and Adonis all the way–and this book is almost impossible to put down. The historical details are brilliantly researched and the basic story of Adonis and what happened to other big wild animals in zoos during the war is based on real-life events. A wonderful story of hurt, kindness, and what it means to be human in an inhumane world.” - The Times of London, Children's Book of the Year

Oh wow! When the Sky Falls is the most emotional and exciting middle grade book that I have read this year! Take a moment to look at the front cover more closely. A fabulous illustration that gives you a peek at what lies inside that cover When the Sky Falls took into a part of WW2 that I haven't previously read about. We have read stories about life on the home front but this is a new angle looking at the struggles of a city zoo. There have been quite a few books dealing with children during the blitz. The horrors and hardships they faced are ones I find truly unimaginable. With such stories, we are stripped of these great heroes and villains we come to expect. What we are left with tends to be more about survival. That living through these events is enough for anyone to go through. In coming to Joseph we see a slightly different view on this. He is someone whose anger we can see boiling up inside him. He feels betrayed and abandoned by all those who are supposed to care for him. And being sent hundreds of miles away only adds to this feeling of isolation. In this case, Joseph never feels overplayed. His feelings and emotions come across as valid to the reader. I think too often writers try and simply their younger characters. They want to show them to be childish and invalidate the experiences they go through. But here I was not only allowed to experience them for what they were but given the reasons behind them. I liked the issues and themes dealt with in this book. Especially for a children's book, the issues were not sugar coated but presented for all age groups to understand which I liked. These issues could be easily understood through the character development and readability. The dyslexia representation was very good - it was interesting to see it through a child's perspective during the war and especially easy to feel Joseph's frustration as we know what he's talking about, but of course in the 1940's they didn’t. This further strengthened the emotion and understanding of themes in this book. The representation of war time was also great. Earle does a great job of bringing the past to light and keeping it accurate. But as well as revolving around the past this story also develops around the question ‘will they pull the trigger to kill Adonis?’. This question not only keeps a tense and exciting atmosphere but also reaches out to readers - I found myself questioning if I would do it - making it a more immersive experience.

This masterful study in loss and redemption is a book strongly influenced by "Kes" and "The Machine Gunners" (I love the little knowing nod to the latter), but the style is all Earle's own, and it ends up sitting proudly by those two fore-runners, as an equal. It will make you weep more than once, and you're going to be biting your nails as it draws towards the climax, but ultimately it's a work that will make your heart sing. Joseph has anger issues, and that is evident from the very onset. But then again, so does Adonis, but for very different reasons. Joseph's situation is particularly poignant, and the author has got it nailed to a tee. Joseph is like a beast trapped in a cage, restricted in his movements, rejected by those around him and ridiculed by his peers. Feeling unloved, unwanted and useless. My thoughts: I definitely enjoyed spending time with the characters in this one. The story itself, well, the plot was hard-to-take at times. I'll try to explain. Hard on the heart. Mrs F. is the owner of a zoo and she takes Joseph to work with her. This is where Joseph meets the strong gorilla named Adonis. At first he wants nothing to do with the animal until the gorilla takes him under his protection