When the Guns Fall Silent

James Riordan (Autor)

Buch | Softcover

176 Seiten

2013 | Reissue
Oxford University Press (Verlag)
9780192735706 (ISBN)

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A powerful, moving, and ultimately hopeful story about one boy's journey to the First World War, of the horrors he faced there, and of the time, amongst all the bloodshed, fighting gave way to football on the frozen ground of No-Man's-Land.

Publishing to coincide with the centenary of the start of the First World War.

Jack, standing among the war graves, sees a face he recognizes. Suddenly, it's 1914 again and he's a young lad back in the trenches. Visions of killing and misery come to him with horrible clarity.

But then Jack remembers too the incredible moment when the guns fell silent for a short time, and fighting gave way to football on the frozen ground of No-Man's-Land.

This amazing story, based on true facts from the First World War, will transport readers back to the war fields of France and show that even in times of conflict and extreme sadness, there is always hope.

James Riordan was born in Portsmouth in 1936 and grew up there during the war. After he left school he worked as a postman, a barman, a crate stacker, a railway clerk, and a double bass player before doing his National Service in the RAF, where he learnt Russian. After demobilization he gained degrees from Birmingham, London, and Moscow, then worked as a translator in Moscow. Back in England he lectured at Portsmouth Polytechnic and Birmingham and Bradford universities and from 1989 at Surrey University where he was Professor of Russian Studies. He wrote over thirty books and his first novel for children, Sweet Clarinet, won the NASEN Award and was shortlisted for the Whitbread Children's Book Award. James Riordan died in 2012