Review: Time School – We Will Remember Them by Nikki Young

Extract:

People don’t often notice their surroundings, especially when they’re in a hurry. That morning, none of the four friends stopped to question why there was a Shire horse and carriage waiting outside the station … 

(Time School by Niki Young. P12.) 

Synopsis:

Jess and her friends are running late for school. Their train gets them to school but not as they know it. They have gone back in time to 1918 – to the time of WW1. Why them? Jess feels the key to understanding what they must do lies with that question. She befriends a girl called Martha and makes a connection with her. There is something she needs to tell Martha.

An engaging time-slip about exploring our connection to the past.

Review:

A short and engaging story about a group of children who visit the past. Jess and her friends are a likable and friendly group who see their situation as an opportunity to experience the past first-hand. They witness the differences between life today and in 1918, and they are humbled by Martha’s living conditions. I loved how this tour of the past focused in on local history – the school grounds, the housing and the railway all look different in the past.

Martha explains what it is like to have family on the war front. I loved Martha. Hearing about the war from the viewpoint of a character can make it easier to imagine than seeing it as a list of facts. This book certainly does a good job of helping children to empathise with people from the past, and Niki Young’s descriptions brought the setting right into my head.

I appreciate this review is short but is difficult to say too much more without spoilers. This would be a lovely read for fans of Charlotte Sometimes, Evie’s Ghost and similar time-slip novels. It would also be a great book to use during projects about WW1. The author’s website says the book with be part of a series. I’m really excited to hear this and hope to see it evolve into something like the My Diary series which was around in my childhood.

 

Thanks to Anne Cater for organising the blog tour and for my copy of Time School. Opinions my own.