How He Comes Out of the Sun

Written by Carlyle Clark

This is a tale focusing on The Nobodies, a team of African-American B-17 flyers who were not supposed to exist. The story opens in the middle of the action, a crew is battling the enemy when a split-decision needs to be made. The language is a bit raw, laced with dialect. Readers need to pay close attention to grasp the meaning.

While I enjoyed the short read and thought the characters well developed for the length of the tale, I would have preferred to see the author embellish the story a bit more. If you enjoy wartime stories, you will be engrossed with this one that has an ending with a twist.

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Guardian:Where a Dream is Challenged “An World War II Plane Who Decides To Never Give Up”

Written by Greer Alexis Bacon

Guardian is a WWII plane who is relating her story in first person. She goes back in time to tell how she met her pilot and together they valiantly fought. One day her fuel tank leaks; Guardian succeeds in getting her pilot down alive. Now that the war is over, she finds herself in a scrap metal junkyard and wonders what became of her pilot. While the rest of the planes are resigned to their fate, Guardian hopes that she will one day fly again, but day after day planes disappear from the yard to be sold for scrap metal.

One day the gate opens to a new owner. The planes will be repaired and sent to various museums. Guardian rejoices that her optimism has proven true, but what has happened to that soldier who once flew and loved her?

Targeted for audiences five and older, this approximately twenty-five page book is really a beginning reader chapter book. There are a few simple, but attractive, illustrations. This book is a well-written sweet story embedding elements of history. While I enjoyed the plot, I noted typos and editing errors on the cover and inside the kindle text edition. If not for these, I would have given the book five stars. I would still recommend it, especially for children who are early readers interested in planes or history.

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Ever the Patriot: Recollections of Vincent J. Riccio World War II Veteran and POW

Edited by Candace Riccio Salem

This book is told in first person based on the experiences of Vincent J. Riccio and edited by his daughter. It begins with the attack on Pearl Harbor and Riccio’s subsequent draft a few months later. Riccio began his service as an aviation mechanic in Mississippi. The first part of the book focuses on his hi jinks and pranks with his buddies as a young soldier. But Riccio wanted to fly; he eventually manages to get training as an aviator. After being sent to Horhem in England, Riccio flew combat missions over Germany. On the Luduigshafen mission, his plane was shot down. Riccio parachuted to safety, but eventually was taken prisoner by the Germans.

The second part of the story focuses on his imprisonment in POW camps and resourcefulness in surviving the Black Hunger March. As the war came closer to its end, Riccio uses his ingenuity to obtain weapons, food and German prisoners. Down to 84 pounds when he was freed from captivity, Riccio warms the reader’s heart when he relates his elation at seeing the Statue of Liberty in New York harbor upon his return to America. I think the gist of the book is best summarized in his own words, “You learn about people, you learn about human nature. You learn what the human body can take. The ones that couldn’t take it, didn’t make it.”

This story contains the gamut of human emotions; Riccio is at once the boy next door and a war hero. He does not judge, but simply tells it like it is. Recommended for teens and adults interested in history and human behavior.

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