I recommend this short series for readers 9 and up. ( )

I loved this book when I was a kid. I read it over and over. Such a great story. Makes me want to find it to read again. Not sure why it popped in my head but so glad I found it on here. :) ( )

Let me just say, this book was a lot better than I originally thought it would be. I usually don't read WWII novels, I am more into the Civil War myself, so this was a different kind of read for me. But let me tell you it was worth it. This book hooked me in on the first sentence. In this book, Margaret and her best friend Elizabeth find a hut in the woods. At first, Margaret is scared to go into it, but with prompting, Margaret goes in. It turns out that Gordy (the class bully) is hiding his deserting brother in the hut. They black mail him in order for them not to tell. Along the way they get into many hardships, but they find a way through it. The cool thing about this book is that even though it is a childrens book, it isn't written like one. This is the perfect book for a child to read because it is all very easy to understand and it is very intriguing. However, an adult would enjoy this book just as much as a child. The way the author portrays everything it is obvious she must have witnessed it. In my personal opinon, eveyone should read this book. It doesn't matter if you don't think you would like it, just trust me, you will. ( )

Companion to "Following My Own Footsteps". Margaret and her best friend Elizabeth both have brothers fighting the war against Hitler, and like everyone else they know, they are filled with feelings of patriotism. But the girls are also involved in their own personal war at home.

Stepping on the Cracks may be set during World War II (my father & uncles' war), but the questions it raises are just as relevant today. The book's heroines, Margaret Baker and Elizabeth Crawford, are three weeks away from being sixth graders when it opens in August of 1944. It's almost Spring when the book ends and the girls have learned a great deal outside of school.

Both girls have older brothers fighting in the war. Gordy Smith, a classmate and bully who has been persecuting bold and pretty Elizabeth since kindergarten, brags about his older brother, Donald, who is a gunner in the war. (Margaret, a self-confessed coward, is also a target of Gordy and his buddies, Toad & Doug, because of her friendship with Elizabeth.)

The girls don't understand why Gordy is such a bully. Elizabeth's father, a cop, has often had to deal with Gordy's alcoholic father. Mr. Crawford considers the Smith family to be 'poor white trash'. I became very angry with Margaret's mother when Margaret tried to tell her what she discovered about the Smith family. Mrs. Baker actually said, 'What people do in their own homes is their own business. It's not for us to interfere.' I wanted to scream at her that her son Jimmy might not be in mortal danger in Europe if someone had interfered when Alois Hitler was cruel to his son, Adolf. (Well, that and if the idiocy that was the Treaty of Versailles at the end of World War I hadn't created fallow ground for the seeds of Nazi evil to grow.)

I felt better about Mrs. Baker after her eyes were opened. I'm the adult grandchild of an alcoholic as well as a former medical librarian, which means I had the motive to learn about alcoholic families and access to professional books and articles on the subject. Mrs. Smith's behavior sadly rings true.

One of the characters is a conscientious objector to the war. I'm glad that Ms. Hahn found a way to demonstrate that he was no coward to the readers, even if many of her characters lacked the sense to figure it out.

Gordy Smith's story is continued in Following My Own Footsteps and As Ever, Gordy.

I would recommend this book to adults as well as children. ( )