Summer of My German Soldier

Summer of My German Soldier is a book by Bette Greene first published in 1973.

The story is told in first person narrative by a twelve-year-old Jewish girl named Patty Bergen living in Jenkinsville, Arkansas during World War II. The story focuses on the friendship between Patty and an escaped German POW named Anton. Patty first meets Anton when a group of German POWs visits her father's store. Anton teaches Patty that she is a person of value. In return, she protects Anton by hiding him above her father's garage.

The book was followed by a sequel, Morning Is a Long Time Coming.

Read more about Summer Of My German Soldier:  Themes, Adaptations, Reception

Famous quotes containing the words summer, german and/or soldier:

    The nectar and ambrosia, are withheld;
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    And pirates of the universe, shut out
    Daily to a more thin and outward rind,
    Turn pale and starve. Therefore, to our sick eyes,
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    Clouds shade the sun, which will not tan our hay,
    And nothing thrives to reach its natural term;
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    By an application of the theory of relativity to the taste of readers, to-day in Germany I am called a German man of science, and in England I am represented as a Swiss Jew. If I come to be regarded as a bĂȘte noire the descriptions will be reversed, and I shall become a Swiss Jew for the Germans and a German man of science for the English!
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    I have no doubt that soldiers well drilled are, as a class, peculiarly destitute of originality and independence.... It is impossible to give the soldier a good education without making him a deserter. His natural foe is the government that drills him.
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