The Boy at the Top of the Mountain by John Boyne (Historical Fiction)

The Boy at the Top of the Mountain starts out with a sweet young boy who is seven years old. His name is Pierrot, he lives in France in 1936 and his mother is French, his father is German. His father is still struggling after his experiences in the first World War. Pierrot has a best friend named Anshel, who lives downstairs and is deaf and Jewish. After an unfortunate series of events, his father dies in the hands of a train crash and his mother dies from tuberculosis, Pierrot is orphaned. He is relieved when he can leave the orphanage when his Aunt Beatrix, who he has never met, offers to have him in. She is a maid at the Berghof, Hilter’s house. He gets taken under Hitler’s wing. The book follows Pierrot from the age of 7 to 16 following his journey from sweet Pierrot to Hitler's loyal pet.

I really enjoyed reading this book. Throughout reading it, I found myself going through a whole mix of emotions. There were many sad moments that came along with Pierrot and his life at Hitler’s side, and many angry moments at his actions and how he was changing as the book went along. It was very sad to see the lengths Pierrot would go to try and get Hilters approval. He had witnessed such horrible things taking place and even took notes through meetings planning a number of horrible events taking place in World War 2, but since he was so desperate for approval he paid no attention to it. This book would be great for anyone who is interested at looking more into the events of World War 2. Since the timeline of the book lines up with World War 2, it is very interesting as the author explains what could have been happening in terms of how often Hilter was around and how life was changing for the people working for him, including his chauffeur, maids, and cooks. The best part of this book in my opinion was the characters. Even the characters that have small parts, like the people who run the orphanage, you can get such a grasp on their backstories just from the little bits they are in the book.

Reviewed by Grace S., Gr. 10