A twelve-year-old boy searches for his father and fights for free press amid the chilling rise of Hitler’s Germany in this second book in the action-packed middle grade series Web of the Spider for fans of I Survived and A Night Divided.
Ansel has never been afraid to say what’s on his mind. He’s always the first among his friends to speak up when something doesn’t feel right. When the Hitler Youth first set up shop in Heroldsberg the year before, Ansel quickly made enemies of the chapter’s arrogant leader, Hans. Of course, Ansel is also twelve years old, so he spends much of his time reading his favorite Dirk Goodly, Boy Detective novels and trying to make his friends laugh.
But more and more of his classmates have been swayed by Hans’s tactics and the Youth organization is growing throughout the city. Ansel knows that Hans and his group are spreading false information—after all, Ansel’s father is a journalist for the local paper and has been going toe to toe with Nazi propaganda for a long time.
Then Ansel’s father goes missing right before a prominent Nazi leader comes to town. With the local police in the Nazi’s pocket, can Ansel and his friends use their detective skills to find his father and thwart the Nazi’s plans to suppress the truth?---from the publisher
176 pages 978-1665947244 Ages 9-13
Keywords: historical fiction, action/adventure, Nazis, oppression, propaganda, journalism, freedom of speech, missing person, fathers, German point of view, European history, 9 year old, 10 year old, 11 year old, 12 year old, 13 year old, part of a series
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Following the events of Rise of the Spider, we return to Heroldsberg, Germany, in 1930. From the point of view of Ansel, a friend of Rolf's, we get a front row seat to the increase in the popularity of the Nazi party in 1930. Ansel's father is a reporter for a Nuremberg newspaper, but with all of the political upheaval, has been given permission to set up a satellite office to better report on what is going on in the smaller town. Along with Klaus, a photographer, he sets up shop in the bakery abandoned by Mrs. Hufnagel, who left the country after her shop was burned. People are unhappy with the economic state of the country, and there are few jobs but lots of frustration. People like Hans are active in groups like the Hitler Youth, which often target Jewish businesses like the Leibowitz's book shop where Ansel gets his Dirk Goodly mystery books. Ansel's father wants the truth to be told about what the Nazis are doing, and when Himmler is set to come to Heroldsberg to speak, he sees it as an opportunity to raise public awareness about the horrible things the Nazis are doing. Unfortunately, the local party chairman is also the chief of police, so when Ansel's father goes missing, asking Chief Muller for help is not an option. Instead, Ansel enlists the help of Rolf and their friend Joshua to investigate and try to locate his father. Working against Hans is fraught with danger, but the stakes are high. With Rolf's family planning to leave Germany for Long Island, and a tragic end to Ansel's investigation, how much worse will things get in Heroldsberg?
While there are plenty of books about World War II, there are relatively few told from the perspective of German characters. My favorites are Marino's The Plot to Kill Hitler series and Osborne's Hitler's Secret, but The Web of the Spider series is even better, since it gives such a good look at what life was like in the time leading up to the war. We think about the Great Depression in the US, but the economy was a global problem. There are definitely parallels to current economic and social difficulties that make this a somewhat cautionary tale.
This book also ends on a cliffhanger, and it will be hard to wait a year to find out what happens next, although I am hoping we get to see a bit of Joshua's perspective. In some ways, it would be interesting to see a book from Hans' perspective. While history paints the Nazis as completely evil, which is certainly true, I often wonder about people who somehow really thought that what they were doing somehow helped their country. It would be interesting, and also cautionary, to explore how ordinary people can be persuaded to participate in such hate filled actions. If any author could do this with finesse, it would be Spradlin, whose Pararescue Jumpers series, Medal of Honor Books, and stand alone novels like Prisoner of War, Into the Killing Seas, and The Enemy Above all focus on characters who do really mean well and are operating under dire circumstances.
Recommended by: Karen Yingling, Teacher Librarian, Ohio USA
See more of her recommendations: https://msyinglingreads.blogspot.com
