Shadow

October 22, 2012
Morpurgo (War Horse) fuses the devastation of war, anguish of the refugee experience, pain of losing loved ones, healing power of friendship, and redemptive influence of a dog's loyalty in this multifaceted novel, first published in 2010. The author also effectively balances three narrators: Matt, an earnest British 14-year-old; his best friend Aman, who escaped to England from Taliban-occupied Afghanistan six years earlier and is now awaiting deportation; and Matt's compassionate grandfather, who uses his skills as a journalist to fight Aman's deportation. Aman's flashbacks to life under the Taliban (who killed his father, imprisoned and tortured his mother, and blew up his home) and to his arduous flight to England with his mother make up the novel's most harrowing passages. At its emotional core, though, is Aman's relationship with Shadow, a remarkably intuitive spaniel with a surprising past that wanders into his family's cave in Afghanistan and guides Aman during their escape. Despite many sobering plot elements, the novel's subject matter never overwhelms Morpurgo's streamlined storytelling and subtle characterizations. Ages 10â14.

Starred review from July 1, 2012
Two 14-year-old boys, one Afghan and one English, find friendship with each other and with two exceptional dogs. Aman and his mother have fled the horrors of life under the Taliban for asylum in England, only to face deportation six years later. His best friend in school and on the soccer fields is Matt, an English boy spending the summer with his grandfather and his grandfather's dog, Dog. Morpurgo tells the story through the voices of Matt, his grandfather and Aman. In the beginning, Matt convinces his grandfather to visit Aman, who is being held in Yarl's Wood, a detention center. His grandfather continues the story, gently persuading Aman to recount what happened in Afghanistan and during the long, treacherous journey to England. The grandfather then organizes a demonstration to protest the deportations, receiving help from sympathetic ministers and an exploding volcano. The titular Shadow is a spaniel, a sniffer dog, trained to alert soldiers to roadside bombs, and she just about steals the story. The dog had bonded with Aman after being separated from her British army unit. Morpurgo has long championed the plight of children and animals in wartime and here ably succeeds in dramatizing the far-reaching repercussions of the decades-old war in Afghanistan. Humanity triumphs over evil and bureaucracy in this heart-rending and heart-affirming story. (postscript, background information on Yarl's Wood and sniffer dogs) (Fiction. 9-14)

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November 1, 2012

Gr 4-8-Friendship transcends cultural and generational differences in this deeply moving novel. It's been six years since Aman and his mother escaped a nightmarish existence under the Taliban regime in Afghanistan for a better life in England. However, their request for asylum is denied, and they're sent to an immigration detention center to await deportation. After several appeals for release go unheeded, they begin to lose hope. Aman's best friend, Matt, shares the tragic details with his journalist grandfather in the hope that he'll visit Aman and write an article garnering public sympathy. Grandpa visits Aman, and after a tense start, gets the boy to open up. At the heart of the story is Shadow, a bomb-sniffing dog for the British army who becomes attached to Aman in Afghanistan after being separated from her unit. Shadow's presence reassures Aman and his mother, as they trek from their village to Kandahar, where they are miraculously reunited with the dog's unit. The memory of Shadow's resilience buoys the teen and his mother as they continue their arduous journey to England. As he did in War Horse (William Morrow, 1983), Morpurgo displays keen sensitivity in using the intense bonds between young people and animals to relate the devastating impacts of war. A useful postcript provides facts about the war in Afghanistan, the real-life Yarl's Wood detention center in Bedfordshire, and bomb-sniffing dogs. Shadow succeeds in evoking empathy and inspiring readers to take a stand for their beliefs.Lalitha Nataraj, Escondido Public Library, CA

Copyright 2012 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 15, 2012
Grades 6-9 After six years in Manchester, England, Matt's best friend and soccer buddy, Aman, 14, is denied asylum. Now Aman is held in a crowded prison with his broken mother, awaiting deportation and terrified of being sent back to the brutality in Afghanistan. Aman tells his story to Matt's grandfather, including the horror he and his mother left behind: his father and grandfather were murdered, and his mother was tortured by the Taliban before their desperate journey across the border to Iran, Turkey, France, and finally England, where they joined Aman's uncle. Now they are being sent back. Morpurgo humanizes the asylum story through one refugee boy's viewpoint. The heartbreak, brutality, and loss are intensified through the crucial role of a stray dog that comes to Aman in a cave and then never leaves him (hence the name Shadow). He turns out to be a champion army dog that saves the refugees, and the animal story, along with the personal war survival drama, is heartrending.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)