The Boy Made of Snow

Author/Guide: Chloe Mayer

Why a Booktrail?

1945: This is not a game, a fairy-tale romance, what we are doing; it’s dangerous.

ISBN: 978-1474604796
Genre: Folklore, Historical, Romance

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What you need to know before your trail

In a sleepy English village in 1944, Annabel and her son Daniel live in the shadow of war. With her husband away, an increasingly isolated Annabel begins to lose her grip on reality.

When mother and son befriend Hans, a German PoW consigned to a nearby farm, their lives are suddenly filled with thrilling secrets.

To Annabel, Hans is an awakening from the darkness that has engulfed her since Daniel’s birth. To her son, a solitary boy caught up in the magical world of fairy tales, he is perhaps a prince in disguise. But Hans has plans of his own and will soon set them into motion with devastating consequences.

Locations

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England - Kent
A: "Bambury"
B: Goodnestone

England - Oxford
C: Banbury Railway Station

Travel Guide

Kent

Bambury is not a real village in Kent but does sound like Banbury in Oxfordshire. However, Graveney Marshes has significant links to Germany and WW2. The Battle of Graveney Marsh, occurred on the night of 27 September 1940 in Kent and was where the crew of a shot-down German Junkers Ju 88 bomber and a detachment of soldiers from the 1st Battalion London Irish Rifles in Seasalter.

Chapters features one or two quotes from a fairytale which highlights the direction of the story in much the same way that the gingerbread crumbs do in one particular fairy tale story. Each story reflects a particular highlight in the book . The Snow Queen for example shows how Gerda seeks to free Kai and unfreeze his heart or how Daniel tries to reach out to his distant mother. The fairy stories have a strong link and influence over the book and its themes.

The fairy story angle is there to highlight the reality of what fairytales really represent and how war leaves some very dark shadows, long after the last gun has fallen silent. As a reader, you get to consider their darkness, their cruelty,and their stark reality that are totally at odds with their more Disney-esque versions. How Daniel tries to protect his mother from the reality of war by bringing the stories she told him to life, and protect his father too from the reality of war.
“The war seemed to have made government official suddenly aware of the existence of the village. First a steady stream of evacuated children were sent to Bambury and now Jerries were being transported here”

Kraut’s farm is one of the places being taken over by the Germans to hold prisoners in a prisoner of war camp.

“There were some rumblings in the village, of course. Fears of Germans escaping, biding their time until they were free to slit dozens of throats in the dead of night as the villagers slept.”