Soon by Morris Gleizman – a review by Charlie, Year 10

soon_uk_2015Soon is the fourth instalment to the Once series about a 13 year old Polish Jew called Felix and is written by the renowned Australian author, Morris Gleitzman. In the previous books (Once, Then and After) we learn about Felix escaping the Nazis after they first murdered his parents in Once, hiding from the Nazis after they hung his best friend Zelda in Then and fighting the Nazis with the Partisans and his new-found guardian Gabriek in After.

In this book we find Felix still living in the rubbly remains of Poland with Gabriek but this time the Nazis have been defeated. However, the town he lives nearby is still in turmoil as it is being terrorized by a new enemy group who go by the slightly less intimidating name of Poland for the Poles and are led by the psychopathic murderer Gogol; whose main aim is to kill as many displaced foreigners as possible.

To sum it up briefly, Felix is taken by Gogol after he tries to help one of Gogol’s victims, escapes from him and in the process picks up a Ukrainian baby whose mother was killed by the Poland for the Poles thugs. He names the baby Pavlo, makes friends with a girl with a grubby pink coat called Anya, who lives with the mysterious Doctor Lipzyk and trys to take Pavlo back to Ukraine with Anya to try and find him a home. What happens to Felix, Anya and Pavlo? Well, you’ll have to read the book for yourself.

All in all, Soon is another brilliant book to add to this series which I very much enjoyed because of its tension, violence and especially its historical accuracy as I knew nothing about what happened in Poland after the Second World War. I would defiantly recommend this book to others but only if you’ve read the previous instalments.