REVIEWED BY QIAO, 12, MANITOBA, CANADA
Winterkill by Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch, Scholastic, ISBN 9781338831412
Qiao reviews her own copy of this book.
In 1930 an attack strike on Kharkiv, Ukraine, brings the bitter wind of early winter. It is a battle not only against famine but also against the Soviet Union’s dictatorship.
Twelve-year-old Nyl, a courageous and intrepid boy, lived on a farm in Ukraine with his parents, aunt, uncle, brother and sister. Everything was peaceful and tranquil until the advent of Stalin, the Soviet Union’s dictator, desiring to take over the farms of Ukrainian families. His lies to the civilians promising a better-off life and a surge of crop yields, if the farmers were willing to spare their farms, were just the beginning of his reigning plot. Nyl’s family depended on the yearly harvest season for food. Without the farm, their life barely scraped by. Even worse, the Soviet Russian soldiers were compelling the villagers to hand in their food by threatening and killing them. Nyl and his family were desperate to flee and embarked on an escape journey from the village to a safer place. It sounded like a fabulous plan but not everyone was lucky enough to make it out of Stalin’s grip.
An encounter with a Canadian girl called Alice altered Nyl’s life. Alice’s first intention in coming to Ukraine with her father was to work for Stalin. She later realized that Stalin was starving people in Ukraine instead of alleviating farmers’ work by providing them with modern tractors. It was a nightmare for her and her father, so they decided to help Nyl escape from this tragic place. Alice’s father was determined to expose Stalin’s lie to the world, hoping to gain help from other countries. Would it be a success, or would it be an act of death?
Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch, a Ukrainian Canadian author, presents the word Holodomor “A murder by hunger” through a story for children. When I read Winterkill, my eyes were glued to the book, reluctant to miss any detail. It was as if every page was the climax, building up the tension and making my heart thump. With ingenious language, her writings about the historical event prompted more than a dozen countries to acknowledge the Holodomor as a genocide. It was as if the book was magical. It gifted me with powers and strength. As Nyl has said in the book, “Stalin hadn’t killed me, he just made me stronger.”
This is Qiao’s first book review for Alphabet Soup. To send us YOUR book review, check out our submission guidelines. Happy reading!
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