Description
The Boy Who Didn’t Want to Die describes an extraordinary journey, made by Peter, a boy of five, through war-torn Europe in 1944 and 1945. Peter and his parents set out from a small Hungarian town, travelling through Austria and then Germany together. Along the way, unforgettable images of adventure flash one after another, catching butterflies in the meadows – and as Peter realises that this adventure is really a nightmare – watching bombs falling from the blue sky outside Vienna, learning maths from his mother in Belsen. All this is drawn against a background of terror, starvations, infection, and inevitable, death, before Peter and his mother can return home.
Review
Peter Lantos grew up in a well-to-do Jewish family in Mako, Hungary. In 1944 the Germans, who already controlled Hungary, decided that it was time to deal with the Jews there too.
As a young boy, Peter first thought it was all a big adventure when his family were moved into a Ghetto. But as they were slowly split up, and his Grandma dies, he realises that it is not a fun adventure at all.
Eventually, together with his mother and father, they are sent via cattle trains to Bergen Belsen. Once there, the men and women were separated but Peter got to stay with his mother. His father eventually died of malnutrition, but Peter survived until they were liberated by the Russians.
Life finally got better when US and then British troops arrived in Hungary, but it was some time before they were able to return home.
When they finally did, Peter came to understand the depth of loss that his family had endured.
It is particularly interesting to learn of Peter’s life after the war, which he chronicles at the end of the book. In 1956, Hungary was given over to Russian communist control and Peter eventually goes on to became a prominent Doctor in London.
With themes of war, hardship, endurance and survival but with an easy to read short format, this is an ideal story for lower secondary readers.
Reviewed by Rob
