Where Poppies Grow: A World War I Companion

Patricia Morley is professor emerita of English and Canadian Studies at
Concordia University and an avid outdoor recreationist. She is the
author of several books, including The Mountain Is Moving: Japanese
Women’s Lives, Kurlek and Margaret Laurence: T

Modern warfare has refined the art of killing to such a degree that the
sheer closeness of World War I combat seems almost medieval. The several
hundred, well-chosen small- and medium-size photographs in this picture
book speak volumes. Chapters typically occupy only two facing pages; the
relatively brief text, set in print of varying sizes, comments on the
images and all that they depict.

Linda Granfield is a passionate historian who has written 19 nonfiction
titles and holds the 2001 Canadian Authors Association Vicky Metcalf
Award for a Body of Work. In Where Poppies Grow she manages to condense
a complex and nightmarish series of events into a strong but simple text
that is both historically accurate as to essential facts yet also
suggestive of the emotional and physical traumas undergone by both
soldiers and civilians. One incredible sepia-toned photo shows a little
girl in a lace dress standing with a jump-rope while in the sky behind
her a bi-plane is bringing down two Zepplins in flames.

Where Poppies Grow deserves a place in all school and home libraries.
Highly recommended.