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The Trenches: Billy Stevens, The Western Front, 1914-1918 (2006)

by Jim Eldridge(Favorite Author)

3.74 of 5 Votes: 5

ISBN

0439938821 (ISBN13: 9780439938822)

languge

English

genre

Historical Fiction

publisher

Scholastic

review 1: In the 'My Story' series this novel tells the tale of 16-year-old Billy Stevens who joins up and is assigned to the Royal Engineers. At home in Carlisle he wishes he were able to go to the front but, after a spell of training and more training, once he is there it is a slightly different matter. However, he is with his friends so he, and they too, make the most of it.He tells his story vividly and the reader really gets the feel for life in the trenches with all the mud, bullets, constant rain and the officer/men relationship. After various sorties, and some near misses, on the battlefield he ends up at Passchendaele where he even spends an interesting Christmas Day there when he and his friends consort with the Germans, even singing Christmas carols together.He sees the f... moreutility of war with first one side and then the other gaining as little as 100 yards before conceding it in the following attack. He loses many of his pals, one of the bravest who is shot for cowardice as he refused to follow orders and go over the top for the umpteenth time.Eventually wounded he returns to his family in Carlisle where he was just grateful not to have been one of the 4,256,528 that were killed in the battlefield conflicts and where he campaigns for his late pal to be included on the war memorial that had been erected as he knew that he was one of the bravest men who fought in the war.The book, which has a useful timeline at its conclusion, really does bring life in the trenches in the period 1914-18 to life and the reader will be very definitely be mud spattered and shell-shocked at the end of this enthralling read!
review 2: The title of this book is The Trenches. The author of this book is Jim Eldridge. I have never read a book from Jim Eldridge but I would like to read another one of his books. The book is about two best friends Billy and Rob who sign up for WW1. Once they get into training Billy gets moved into a engineering group. Once Billy gets to the front he sees how bad it is Billy Finnaly finds Rob. But later Billy finds out that Rob gets killed. Read the book to find out more. I would recommed thos book to any in grade 6 and above and to any one who like military booksMy favorite part of the book is when Billy and Rob sign up with out there parents knowing. My least favorite part is when Jed told Billy that Rob died. The main characters in this book is Billy,Rob and Charlie Billys other friend. I like the characters in this book because they are realistic and sometimes funny. This book is defently my favorite book i have read. And there are many more books like this one by Jim Eldrige. less

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