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In 1943, a British fighter plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France and the survivor tells a tale of friendship, war, espionage, and great courage as she relates what she must to survive while keeping secret all that she can.Tags
Recommendations
Member Recommendations
amysisson Both are about the unusual ways in which women may impact the tides of war
71
rarm Set on opposite sides of the pond, but both are about wartime aviatrices and wonderfully depict female friendship.
40
Herenya Firebirds Soaring contains "Something Worth Doing" (by Wein) about Theo, a pilot and minor character from Code Name Verity.
20
amysisson Young adults struggling to survive in war-torn England -- although different wars (one real, one fictional) in different times! These books are different, yet I really feel that if you love one, you'll love the other.
20
saraOm7 These are both about teenage girls working as spies in France during WWII, though one has a much happier ending than the other.
BookshelfMonstrosity Both of these historical fiction novels are fast-paced, well researched accounts detailing the lives of strong-willed female narrators who struggle with complex moral issues. Both stories are character-driven, giving these important historical events a relatable, human face and voice.
calmclam Both focus on girls in/around England adapting to the changing circumstances of World War II via their journals.
Member Reviews
Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein is so much more than just a World War II novel. At heart, it's the story of a true friendship between two young women. "Verity," a wireless operator, parachutes in to Nazi-occupied France from a disabled plane flown by Maddie, her best friend. Verity is captured by Nazi intelligence shortly after landing. She's tortured and imprisoned, not knowing what has become of Maddie, or whether her friend is even still alive. In return for a few more torture-free days, Verity promises to write everything she knows about the British war effort. What she writes is the story of her friendship with Maddie.
If you can suspend disbelief on that one point -- that the Nazi intelligence officer would allow Verity to write show more such a rambling "confession" of questionable usefulness -- this is a phenomenal book. It's very hard to write anything more about it without spoiling some aspect of the story, which is by turns sweet and tragic and funny and heartbreaking. And the last couple pages brought tears to my eyes. Don't miss this book -- it's definitely earned a spot as one of my favorites of the year, and the best World War II novel I've read since The Book Thief. show less
If you can suspend disbelief on that one point -- that the Nazi intelligence officer would allow Verity to write show more such a rambling "confession" of questionable usefulness -- this is a phenomenal book. It's very hard to write anything more about it without spoiling some aspect of the story, which is by turns sweet and tragic and funny and heartbreaking. And the last couple pages brought tears to my eyes. Don't miss this book -- it's definitely earned a spot as one of my favorites of the year, and the best World War II novel I've read since The Book Thief. show less
Summary: Verity is a young British woman, being held by the Gestapo in a small town in Nazi-occupied France in 1943. Under torture, she's agreed to tell her captors everything she knows, but she demands two weeks to write out her story, even though she knows when the time is up, she'll most likely be executed… if she's lucky. Her story involves how she came to be in France, and heavily features her best friend, Maddie, a pilot who flies ferry planes within Britain as part of the Air Transport Auxiliary.
That's probably one of the least-useful summaries I've written, but so much of the fun of this book is piecing things together for yourself that I don't want to say too much more.
Review: This book was amazing. Unputdownably good. You show more should read it. Right now.
But this book is also really difficult to talk about why it's so good without giving away a lot of the details that make it good. But I'll give it a go.
First up, the characters are great. Verity and Maddie feel like real people, people who crawl into your heart without your noticing, and then cause it to break, repeatedly. But the secondary characters are also really interesting, as you tease details about them out from the course of the main story. (I also have a rather large crush on Jamie, now.) The history is also really great. Every time I feel like I'm fed up with World War II novels, that there can't be a WWII novel with a new angle, something like Code Name Verity comes along to shut me up. I'd never heard of women pilots during the war, and Verity's role in things was also fascinating. Wein also includes a good author's note that discusses her sources, and the (few) times she deviates from historical fact.
The plotting of the novel is different from normal - since it's Verity telling her story while she's still a prisoner it sort of starts from the middle and spreads out from there, jumping back and forth through time. But Wein makes it all work together, building the suspense and tension and throwing in a bunch of twists and turns that make you go back and re-read and re-evaluate previous scenes. This is one of those books that you finish and immediately want to go re-read, not only to figure out what's really going on, but also because it's so immersive that it's hard to put it down and drag yourself back out of. 5 out of 5 stars.
Recommendation: Absolutely highly recommended. It's listed as YA, but it's older YA, and really, I think anyone who likes WWII stories or spies or pilots or stories of bravery and friendship, or novels that require paying attention and that keep you guessing, will enjoy this book. show less
That's probably one of the least-useful summaries I've written, but so much of the fun of this book is piecing things together for yourself that I don't want to say too much more.
Review: This book was amazing. Unputdownably good. You show more should read it. Right now.
But this book is also really difficult to talk about why it's so good without giving away a lot of the details that make it good. But I'll give it a go.
First up, the characters are great. Verity and Maddie feel like real people, people who crawl into your heart without your noticing, and then cause it to break, repeatedly. But the secondary characters are also really interesting, as you tease details about them out from the course of the main story. (I also have a rather large crush on Jamie, now.) The history is also really great. Every time I feel like I'm fed up with World War II novels, that there can't be a WWII novel with a new angle, something like Code Name Verity comes along to shut me up. I'd never heard of women pilots during the war, and Verity's role in things was also fascinating. Wein also includes a good author's note that discusses her sources, and the (few) times she deviates from historical fact.
The plotting of the novel is different from normal - since it's Verity telling her story while she's still a prisoner it sort of starts from the middle and spreads out from there, jumping back and forth through time. But Wein makes it all work together, building the suspense and tension and throwing in a bunch of twists and turns that make you go back and re-read and re-evaluate previous scenes. This is one of those books that you finish and immediately want to go re-read, not only to figure out what's really going on, but also because it's so immersive that it's hard to put it down and drag yourself back out of. 5 out of 5 stars.
Recommendation: Absolutely highly recommended. It's listed as YA, but it's older YA, and really, I think anyone who likes WWII stories or spies or pilots or stories of bravery and friendship, or novels that require paying attention and that keep you guessing, will enjoy this book. show less
[4 and 1/2 stars]
This story of two female British operatives in Nazi-occupied France was very impressive, and also, I'm finding, very difficult to review without giving anything away! Suffice to say that I increasingly loved the two vivid central characters, and how the author managed to humanise even the Gestapo officers and collaborators. I think she also created, for the most part, a very strong sense of time and place, and that's another plus for me. But it's the cleverness of the narrative structure that I'm really struck by, and I'd like to re-read it again quite soon to catch all the delicately-placed clues I didn't get the first time through.
This story of two female British operatives in Nazi-occupied France was very impressive, and also, I'm finding, very difficult to review without giving anything away! Suffice to say that I increasingly loved the two vivid central characters, and how the author managed to humanise even the Gestapo officers and collaborators. I think she also created, for the most part, a very strong sense of time and place, and that's another plus for me. But it's the cleverness of the narrative structure that I'm really struck by, and I'd like to re-read it again quite soon to catch all the delicately-placed clues I didn't get the first time through.
I stayed up till two last night trying to desperately finish this book, even though I knew that the ending could never be happy. Still... I hoped. I hoped.
It's World War II, and "Verity," a Scottish spy, is captured by the Gestapo while conducting a secret operation in France. In order to prolong her life, she agrees to tell her captors the truth about her life and her work as a spy. The first half or so of the book is her personal confession, and she tells the truth - but that truth might not be what the Nazis were expecting. Verity is not the only one who is in danger from the Nazis - her best friend, Maddie, a civilian pilot who delivered Verity to France, is also in France, hiding from the Gestapo, and she is desperate to find her show more captured friend.
The sacrifices that each girl makes for the other broke my heart, and their characters really grew in my mind, until I could not put the book down. I am not very familiar with the role of women during World War II, especially in Britain, but from what little I studied, this book is for the most part historically plausible.
There is only one very small peeve that I have, and that isn't even with the book itself. It's with the historical notice. Now, I know this is me being a Douchey McNitpick, but this small sentence did bother me a tad at about 2 in the morning last night. It was at the very last paragraph of her end-of-the-book historical notice, where Wein thanks the people who were involved with World War II and influenced her throughout her life. Here's the quote, where she described what these people did:
"...who during the global conflict of the Second World War were variously Resistance fighters, camouflage unit artists, RAF fighter pilots, and USAF transport pilots, child evacuees, prisoners in American as well as German concentration camps..."
Sigh. The detainment of Japanese-Americans during World War II by FDR was an easy way out to the difficult problem of Japanese spies in America, but I don't believe it was the right way. It was cruel and it was not complementary with the values of freedom and liberty that my country stands for. However, I would not have chosen to put the American internment camps in the same breath as the German concentration camps. I respect my audience very highly, so I doubt that I need to go into the atrocities that happened at the Nazi prison camps, as well as the inhumane actions at the Japanese concentration camps. My only wish is that Wein would've chosen her words more carefully, because the American internment camps are not comparable to the German or Japanese concentration camps.
Other than that small sentence (which isn't even techincally a part of the story anyway), this book was a deep and moving read for me. It's rare nowadays for there to be a good YA book about a close friendship, especially between two people of the same sex. Everyone assumes that two people who are very close are romantically in love, but that is not always the case, and I believe it is a great disservice to what love is if we all think that. I hope that there will be more books like "Code Name Verity" that show the power of a close and passionate friendship.
Best quote from the book: "It's like being in love, discovering your best friend." show less
It's World War II, and "Verity," a Scottish spy, is captured by the Gestapo while conducting a secret operation in France. In order to prolong her life, she agrees to tell her captors the truth about her life and her work as a spy. The first half or so of the book is her personal confession, and she tells the truth - but that truth might not be what the Nazis were expecting. Verity is not the only one who is in danger from the Nazis - her best friend, Maddie, a civilian pilot who delivered Verity to France, is also in France, hiding from the Gestapo, and she is desperate to find her show more captured friend.
The sacrifices that each girl makes for the other broke my heart, and their characters really grew in my mind, until I could not put the book down. I am not very familiar with the role of women during World War II, especially in Britain, but from what little I studied, this book is for the most part historically plausible.
There is only one very small peeve that I have, and that isn't even with the book itself. It's with the historical notice. Now, I know this is me being a Douchey McNitpick, but this small sentence did bother me a tad at about 2 in the morning last night. It was at the very last paragraph of her end-of-the-book historical notice, where Wein thanks the people who were involved with World War II and influenced her throughout her life. Here's the quote, where she described what these people did:
"...who during the global conflict of the Second World War were variously Resistance fighters, camouflage unit artists, RAF fighter pilots, and USAF transport pilots, child evacuees, prisoners in American as well as German concentration camps..."
Sigh. The detainment of Japanese-Americans during World War II by FDR was an easy way out to the difficult problem of Japanese spies in America, but I don't believe it was the right way. It was cruel and it was not complementary with the values of freedom and liberty that my country stands for. However, I would not have chosen to put the American internment camps in the same breath as the German concentration camps. I respect my audience very highly, so I doubt that I need to go into the atrocities that happened at the Nazi prison camps, as well as the inhumane actions at the Japanese concentration camps. My only wish is that Wein would've chosen her words more carefully, because the American internment camps are not comparable to the German or Japanese concentration camps.
Other than that small sentence (which isn't even techincally a part of the story anyway), this book was a deep and moving read for me. It's rare nowadays for there to be a good YA book about a close friendship, especially between two people of the same sex. Everyone assumes that two people who are very close are romantically in love, but that is not always the case, and I believe it is a great disservice to what love is if we all think that. I hope that there will be more books like "Code Name Verity" that show the power of a close and passionate friendship.
Best quote from the book: "It's like being in love, discovering your best friend." show less
"But I have told the truth. Isn't that ironic? They sent me because I am so good at telling lies. But I have told the truth."
This tale of two war-time friends, women doing men's jobs, who would never have met had World War II not thrown them together. "Queenie" writes her confession and as much war information as possible down for her Nazi interrogators in an effort to escape further torture. She writes about meeting Maddie, a passionate pilot from Stockport, their secret trips around the UK delivering information, and their planned incursion into France. When we hear Maddie's side of the story, Queenie evidently held back a bit...
Queenie's confession is angry, afraid, vicious and submissive in equal measures. It takes a long time to show more realise that she's an unreliable narrator, and I was still be surprised well towards the end of the novel. I loved that the girls' two stories became intertwined towards the end, and there was a long resolution, time for everything to get neatly tied up and complete all those niggling plot questions.
The girls' relationship is really strong, quite interesting actually. I wish they'd had a few more arguments to make the relationship more real; it seemed a little like hero worship. But both girls are very independent and strong-willed in different ways and they react to the crisis in very different and distinct ways. I was also very impressed by Wein's use of secondary characters; the female German agent, the young daughters in the French family, and even Von Loewe, the evil German interrogator, are all complex characters, not mono-faceted.
Definitely recommended for a different perspective on working women in the mid-twentieth century, and for women in the war. And just for a great girls' story in which men are not the primary discussion point! show less
This tale of two war-time friends, women doing men's jobs, who would never have met had World War II not thrown them together. "Queenie" writes her confession and as much war information as possible down for her Nazi interrogators in an effort to escape further torture. She writes about meeting Maddie, a passionate pilot from Stockport, their secret trips around the UK delivering information, and their planned incursion into France. When we hear Maddie's side of the story, Queenie evidently held back a bit...
Queenie's confession is angry, afraid, vicious and submissive in equal measures. It takes a long time to show more realise that she's an unreliable narrator, and I was still be surprised well towards the end of the novel. I loved that the girls' two stories became intertwined towards the end, and there was a long resolution, time for everything to get neatly tied up and complete all those niggling plot questions.
The girls' relationship is really strong, quite interesting actually. I wish they'd had a few more arguments to make the relationship more real; it seemed a little like hero worship. But both girls are very independent and strong-willed in different ways and they react to the crisis in very different and distinct ways. I was also very impressed by Wein's use of secondary characters; the female German agent, the young daughters in the French family, and even Von Loewe, the evil German interrogator, are all complex characters, not mono-faceted.
Definitely recommended for a different perspective on working women in the mid-twentieth century, and for women in the war. And just for a great girls' story in which men are not the primary discussion point! show less
The less you know about the contents of this book going into it, the better your reading experience will be. For CODE NAME VERITY is a truly exquisite book, one of those rare stories that will touch the heart of every reader who is fortunate enough to encounter it.
CODE NAME VERITY is fueled by the memorable narrative of a feisty, fiery, and fiercely intelligent and loyal character who will shoot her way to the top of your “favorite characters” list. I don’t know about you, but I go absolutely head over heels for characters who are smarter than me, those whose intelligence isn’t shoved into my face with telling sentences, but instead unfolds over the course of the book.
The book winds through flight and war terminology but show more transcends historical fiction with its narrator’s fun, relatable, and just basically genuine voice. I found myself practically cackling with laughter at the narrator’s numerous antics, even in her terrifying situation. Elizabeth Wein’s writing is brilliant: the pace and style of words mimic the event that the narrator is telling, long or short, dialogue vs. narration, profound vs. charming.
You’ll notice that I didn’t use any names in this review. That’s because, first of all, the war setting makes it unclear whether or not the characters are using their real names, and secondly, part of the enjoyment of this book is figuring out when characters are telling the truth and when they are not. Don’t let that—or my woefully inadequate review—deter you. Read CODE NAME VERITY; I am 99% sure you won’t regret it. Recommended for readers who enjoy historical fiction set in World War II and character-driven novels. show less
CODE NAME VERITY is fueled by the memorable narrative of a feisty, fiery, and fiercely intelligent and loyal character who will shoot her way to the top of your “favorite characters” list. I don’t know about you, but I go absolutely head over heels for characters who are smarter than me, those whose intelligence isn’t shoved into my face with telling sentences, but instead unfolds over the course of the book.
The book winds through flight and war terminology but show more transcends historical fiction with its narrator’s fun, relatable, and just basically genuine voice. I found myself practically cackling with laughter at the narrator’s numerous antics, even in her terrifying situation. Elizabeth Wein’s writing is brilliant: the pace and style of words mimic the event that the narrator is telling, long or short, dialogue vs. narration, profound vs. charming.
You’ll notice that I didn’t use any names in this review. That’s because, first of all, the war setting makes it unclear whether or not the characters are using their real names, and secondly, part of the enjoyment of this book is figuring out when characters are telling the truth and when they are not. Don’t let that—or my woefully inadequate review—deter you. Read CODE NAME VERITY; I am 99% sure you won’t regret it. Recommended for readers who enjoy historical fiction set in World War II and character-driven novels. show less
Code Name Verity
By: Elizabeth E. Wein
Genre: YA Historical Fiction
Pub Date: May 15th, 2012
Rating: PG-13 for scenes of torture
Coffee Beans: 5/5
Spoilers: No way, José!
Favorite Line: “It was cozy in perhaps the way you’d be cozy in hell.” (ebook, pg 62)& “It’s like being in love, discovering your best friend.” (ebook, pg 80) & “And that I don’t believe in God but if I did, if I did, It would be the God of Moses, angry and demanding and OUT FOR REVENGE,and…”(ebook, pg 318)
Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for this honest review
Publisher’s Summary:
Oct. 11th, 1943—A British spy plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France. Its pilot and passenger are best friends. One show more of the girls has a chance at survival. The other has lost the game before it's barely begun.
When “Verity” is arrested by the Gestapo, she's sure she doesn’t stand a chance. As a secret agent captured in enemy territory, she’s living a spy’s worst nightmare. Her Nazi interrogators give her a simple choice: reveal her mission or face a grisly execution.
As she intricately weaves her confession, Verity uncovers her past, how she became friends with the pilot Maddie, and why she left Maddie in the wrecked fuselage of their plane. On each new scrap of paper, Verity battles for her life, confronting her views on courage and failure and her desperate hope to make it home. But will trading her secrets be enough to save her from the enemy?
Harrowing and beautifully written, Elizabeth Wein creates a visceral read of danger, resolve, and survival that shows just how far true friends will go to save each other. Code Name Verity is an outstanding novel that will stick with you long after the last page.
My Review:
I really hate Microsoft Word. It randomly “stopped responding” and erased everything I wrote about this book. I’m going through breathing techniques right now, trying to resist the impulse I have to throw this computer through the back yard and into the sprinklers right now.)Let’s try this again, shall we?
There’s not much I can say about this book without giving away the plot—which I don’t want to do. This book is about the strength and love shared between best friends. About people banding together, risking everything to fight for strangers because they believe that they deserve more than what they have. It’s about the deep, deep hollow that’s created in one’s soul at the pain someone they love is suffering through.
My throat tightened, my heart ached, my fingers kept turning pages. And at the very last page, I mourned the losses and I cherished the victories and I had hope for the lives of those who survived.
This is a fictional story, but the events that happened—the war, the Holocaust, the killing, the torture, the loss of so much—that is what I mourned at the last page of the book. Because in the end, what happened between these covers is only one of a million stories or possibilities of what some of our grandparents, parents, great-grandparents lived through. And like Wein’s very last words: LEST WE FORGET.
Now, on to a more specific review. I’m not a fan of historical fiction, normally, but I decided to give this one a go (mostly because I was in an ARC requesting frenzy), and I’m so glad I did. I’m also pleased as punch that I’m reading so many good authors, as of late. Elizabeth is one of them. She is, in one word, brilliant. The story she wrote is astounding in its complexity. But you don’t realize it until the last third of the book. And here’s why:
The last third is told from someone else’s point of view.
I’ll admit, at first this really threw me for a loop. I didn’t like it. I thought it was dumb. Why the heck do I want (excuse me while I obsessively save my work in Word, lest we have another melt down), why the heck do I want to read this story from another pov? I like the one I’m in (she’s funny and snarky and very specifically random). And to be honest, I don’t like the new voice. At first. Then I fell in love.
Both parts of the narrative are distinctly different, but neither is whole without the other. You start to pick up on clues with what the first girl had to say and how it plays into what’s said in the second part. Then you start to think about the brains Wein has to construct both parts to make them independent but then a terrific mind puzzle when they’re together. So brilliant.
I won’t say anymore, sorry for the abrupt ending, but I don’t want to risk saying anything that would ruin the story. Please, I implore you, if this book sounds even remotely interesting to you, pick it up and read it. And share it with others. It’s that good.
Happy reading, my friends!
http://RaeLynnFry.Blogspot.com show less
By: Elizabeth E. Wein
Genre: YA Historical Fiction
Pub Date: May 15th, 2012
Rating: PG-13 for scenes of torture
Coffee Beans: 5/5
Spoilers: No way, José!
Favorite Line: “It was cozy in perhaps the way you’d be cozy in hell.” (ebook, pg 62)& “It’s like being in love, discovering your best friend.” (ebook, pg 80) & “And that I don’t believe in God but if I did, if I did, It would be the God of Moses, angry and demanding and OUT FOR REVENGE,and…”(ebook, pg 318)
Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for this honest review
Publisher’s Summary:
Oct. 11th, 1943—A British spy plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France. Its pilot and passenger are best friends. One show more of the girls has a chance at survival. The other has lost the game before it's barely begun.
When “Verity” is arrested by the Gestapo, she's sure she doesn’t stand a chance. As a secret agent captured in enemy territory, she’s living a spy’s worst nightmare. Her Nazi interrogators give her a simple choice: reveal her mission or face a grisly execution.
As she intricately weaves her confession, Verity uncovers her past, how she became friends with the pilot Maddie, and why she left Maddie in the wrecked fuselage of their plane. On each new scrap of paper, Verity battles for her life, confronting her views on courage and failure and her desperate hope to make it home. But will trading her secrets be enough to save her from the enemy?
Harrowing and beautifully written, Elizabeth Wein creates a visceral read of danger, resolve, and survival that shows just how far true friends will go to save each other. Code Name Verity is an outstanding novel that will stick with you long after the last page.
My Review:
I really hate Microsoft Word. It randomly “stopped responding” and erased everything I wrote about this book. I’m going through breathing techniques right now, trying to resist the impulse I have to throw this computer through the back yard and into the sprinklers right now.)Let’s try this again, shall we?
There’s not much I can say about this book without giving away the plot—which I don’t want to do. This book is about the strength and love shared between best friends. About people banding together, risking everything to fight for strangers because they believe that they deserve more than what they have. It’s about the deep, deep hollow that’s created in one’s soul at the pain someone they love is suffering through.
My throat tightened, my heart ached, my fingers kept turning pages. And at the very last page, I mourned the losses and I cherished the victories and I had hope for the lives of those who survived.
This is a fictional story, but the events that happened—the war, the Holocaust, the killing, the torture, the loss of so much—that is what I mourned at the last page of the book. Because in the end, what happened between these covers is only one of a million stories or possibilities of what some of our grandparents, parents, great-grandparents lived through. And like Wein’s very last words: LEST WE FORGET.
Now, on to a more specific review. I’m not a fan of historical fiction, normally, but I decided to give this one a go (mostly because I was in an ARC requesting frenzy), and I’m so glad I did. I’m also pleased as punch that I’m reading so many good authors, as of late. Elizabeth is one of them. She is, in one word, brilliant. The story she wrote is astounding in its complexity. But you don’t realize it until the last third of the book. And here’s why:
The last third is told from someone else’s point of view.
I’ll admit, at first this really threw me for a loop. I didn’t like it. I thought it was dumb. Why the heck do I want (excuse me while I obsessively save my work in Word, lest we have another melt down), why the heck do I want to read this story from another pov? I like the one I’m in (she’s funny and snarky and very specifically random). And to be honest, I don’t like the new voice. At first. Then I fell in love.
Both parts of the narrative are distinctly different, but neither is whole without the other. You start to pick up on clues with what the first girl had to say and how it plays into what’s said in the second part. Then you start to think about the brains Wein has to construct both parts to make them independent but then a terrific mind puzzle when they’re together. So brilliant.
I won’t say anymore, sorry for the abrupt ending, but I don’t want to risk saying anything that would ruin the story. Please, I implore you, if this book sounds even remotely interesting to you, pick it up and read it. And share it with others. It’s that good.
Happy reading, my friends!
http://RaeLynnFry.Blogspot.com show less
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Published Reviews
If you pick up this book, it will be some time before you put your dog-eared, tear-stained copy back down. Wein succeeds on three fronts: historical verisimilitude, gut-wrenching mystery, and a first-person voice of such confidence and flair that the protagonist might become a classic character if only we knew what to call her. Alternately dubbed Queenie, Eva, Katharina, Verity, or Julie show more depending on which double-agent operation she's involved in, she pens her tale as a confession while strapped to a chair and recovering from the latest round of Gestapo torture. The Nazis want the codes that Julie memorized as a wireless operator, and she supplies them, but along the way also tells of her fierce friendship with Maddie, a British pilot. Though delivered at knifepoint, Julie's narrative is peppered with dark humor and minor acts of defiance, and the tension that builds up is practically unbearable. show less
added by kthomp25
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Survival, plane crash -- children's/young adult fiction
112 works; 3 members
Modern Books for Young Adults
87 works; 11 members
Carnegie Medal books I've read (shortlist and winners)
86 works; 16 members
SantaThing 2014 Gifts
299 works; 17 members
Books Read in 2014
2,341 works; 89 members
Children's Books about World War II (1939-1945)
143 works; 12 members
Books Read in 2015
3,298 works; 129 members
Books Read in 2016
4,666 works; 199 members
Books We Discovered On LibraryThing
530 works; 130 members
Author Information
24+ Works 10,101 Members
Elizabeth Wein was born in New York City in 1964. She went to the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia where she earned a PhD in Folklore and held a Javits Fellowship. Elizabeth Wein first five books for young adults are set in Arthurian Britain and sixth century Ethiopia. The Mark of Solomon, was published in two parts as The Lion Hunter show more (2007) and The Empty Kingdom (2008). The Lion Hunter was short-listed for the Andre Norton Award for Best Young Adult Fantasy and Science Fiction in 2008. Elizabeth's novel for teens, Code Name Verity, published by Egmont UK, Disney-Hyperion and Doubleday Canada in 2012, is a World War II thriller in which two young girls, one a Resistance spy and the other a transport pilot, become unlikely best friends. Code Name Verity has received widespread critical acclaim including being shortlisted for the CILIP Carnegie Medal, it is a Michael Printz Award Honor Book, a Boston Globe/Horn Book Awards Honor Book, and an SCBWI Golden Kite Honor Book. It is also a New York Times Bestseller in young adult fiction. She is also the author of Black Dove, White Raven. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Elizabeth Wein is a LibraryThing Author, an author who lists their personal library on LibraryThing.
Some Editions
Awards and Honors
Awards
Distinctions
Notable Lists
Series
Work Relationships
Common Knowledge
- Canonical title
- Code Name Verity
- Original title
- Code Name Verity
- Original publication date
- 2012-06-02
- People/Characters
- Julia "Queenie" Beaufort-Stuart; Maddie Brodatt; Anna Engel; Amadeus von Linden; Jamie Beaufort-Stuart
- Important places
- Manchester, England, UK; Ormaie, France
- Important events
- World War II, German Occupation of France (1940 | 1944); French Resistance; World War II (1939 | 1945)
- Epigraph
- "Passive resisters must understand that they are as important as saboteurs." –SOE Secret Operations Manual, 'Methods of Passive Resistance'
- Dedication
- For Amanda
–we make a sensational team– - First words
- I AM A COWARD. I wanted to be heroic and I pretended I was. I have always been good at pretending.
- Quotations
- I have told the truth.
"Kiss me, Hardy!"
The soaring mountains rose around her, and the poets' waters glittered beneath her in the valleys of memory—hosts of golden daffodils, "Swallows and Amazons", Peter Rabbit. (p. 28)
Fly the plane, Maddie. - Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)I do mean fly safely. And I do mean come back.
- Publisher's editor
- November, Sharyn (Viking Children's Books); Paskins, Stella (Egmont UK); Onder, Catherine (Disney Hyperion Books for Children); Black, Amy (Doubleday Canada)
- Blurbers
- Anderson, Laurie Halse; Stiefvater, Maggie
- Canonical DDC/MDS
- 813.6
- Canonical LCC
- PZ7.W4358
Classifications
- Genres
- Teen, Young Adult, Fiction and Literature, Historical Fiction
- DDC/MDS
- 813.6 — Literature & rhetoric American literature in English American fiction in English 2000-
- LCC
- PZ7 .W4358 — Language and Literature Fiction and juvenile belles lettres Fiction and juvenile belles lettres Juvenile belles lettres
- BISAC
Statistics
- Members
- 5,700
- Popularity
- 2,291
- Reviews
- 406
- Rating
- (4.27)
- Languages
- 10 — Dutch, English, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish, Swedish
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 64
- ASINs
- 20
