Such a Character
in a good way
I’ve found another middle grade love, The Bletchley Riddle by Ruta Sepetys and Steve Sheinkin. The characters, the setting, the plot, all top notch. It’s historical fiction about two “quarrelsome siblings,” ages 14 and 19, each working to solve something during the start of WWII. The older, Jakob, is one of Britain’s top young minds and is helping to crack the Nazi’s Enigma cipher, while Lizze is on a mission to solve the mysterious disappearance of their mother. From the great cover to the tons of awards and accolades to the two powerhouse writers who I adore, I highly recommend it.
I have to admit I’m not always a fan of books that revolve around puzzles and riddles. If the plot hangs on the reader solving a riddle, it takes me out of the story and I lose patience with it. This is funny because my WIP revolves around kids solving riddles to get themselves out of a tome they’ve traveled into! So I’m obviously not entirely against riddles in stories, but it has to be done in a way that doesn’t slow down the story. This one does it well. If you don’t entirely follow how the Enigma machine works (a machine the Nazis used to code messages) you’ll still understand the story. And for those with quizzical engineering minds, there’s lots of cool info about how it all worked.
I finally got a minute to dive into The Bletchley Riddle during a Hampton Inn breakfast that wasn’t half bad, fueling up for day two on the floor of The Texas Homeschool Expo in New Braunfels.
If day two was anything like day one, I’d be on my feet from 9 to 4 with nary a bathroom or lunch break, so there I sat, refueling with some eggs and a bagel and coffee and The Bletchley Riddle held open by the weight of my phone so I could read and eat, one of life’s great pleasures. I was so hooked. Short chapters, alternating viewpoints, and voicey characters . . . this is my jam. Take a gander at this descriptive masterpiece from chapter six, one of Lizzie’s chapters:
When Gran enters a room, people stop talking. Her nose is always slightly elevated, as if she detects a foul smell. Her ashen hair sits in a quivering pile atop her head and her spectacles, if not teetering on the end of her sniffer, hang from a sterling chain to rest upon her ample bosom. Gran’s figure resembles an upholstered settee. Overstuffed. Expensive but uncomfortable to sit on. And she insists on formality. Demands it. To Gran, I am Elizabeth, never Lizzie.
“Nicknames such as ‘Lizzie’ are reserved for barmaids and axe murderers, of which you are neither,” she once said.
Not yet, I should have replied. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
I love “sniffer” instead of nose, love the visual of an overstuffed settee to describe this imperious Gran, and absolutely love Lizzie’s sass as well as her restraint from spilling her sass out loud. If she did, she’d border on bratty. But she’s respectfully sassy. Love it.
I recently discovered Sarah Allen’s Substack Sarah’s Smorgasborg (love that word) and especially enjoyed this post about Pixar. She notes how the stakes are character-driven in their earlier movies. “There is no Toy Story without Woody or Buzz,” Sarah says.
“The internal goal for Woody is to be Andy’s favorite toy, and the external evidence of that is that precious spot on the bed.” Yes! And he defends it, fights for it, as a cowboy would. Put him with Buzz, this big-chested Space Ranger who has his own wants and desires, driven by a call to greatness, “to infinity, and beyond!” and you’ve got conflict with heart. What happens when Buzz is the boy’s chosen one? Oof.
Back to The Bletchley Riddle, and our fantastic characters. We’re also firmly placed in a setting that almost feels like a character: London just before the German invasion.
“It’s unsettling, watching Europe’s largest city prepare to hide in the dark.
Lights are gone from the lampposts. Blackout drapes hang in the windows of flats. Cars have switched on their head-lamps, but they’re covered with plastic lids, each with a few thin slits that let out only a dim glow. Thick white lines have been painted on the pavement to help guide drivers in the dark.”
It’s not an info dump. You’re right there. This is what I’m reaching for as a writer and a reader-to tell a story so immersive you leave the plastic chair, the mediocre coffee and eggs, and portal to another world. I hope you get to meet Lizzie and her older brother Jakob. They had my heart from the start.
Happy little things
Salsa flights and sharing tacos with my two daughter-in-laws at a picnic table bordering a garden that provided some of the ingredients for our dinner
Grandbabies in their swimsuits, splashing in the “warm” tub (we kept it in the low 80’s)
The Faith and Arts retreat I attended this past weekend, and the fact that my church celebrates the arts, and sees how they intrinsically connect to our faith- this quote from one of our lectures was a balm:
“Doing and making are acts of hope, and as that hope grows, we stop feeling overwhelmed by the troubles of the world. We remember that we - as individuals and groups - can do something about those troubles.”
- Corita Kent
Wook Drake by Millie Watters, who attended our retreat and shared the Corita Kent quote during her lecture
My name is Meredith Davis, and I’m an award winning writer of middle grade books, a former indie bookseller, founder of the Austin chapter of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators and graduate of Vermont College of Fine Arts with an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults. Find teaching resources and author visit information on my website at www.meredithldavis.com. Mother to three, Nana to two, I live with my husband and a crazy doodle in Austin, Texas.
