The characters are heartbreakingly lovable. The gaggle of schoolboys, Simon, Peter and Rupert, who go from childish antics at boarding school to growing up to fight a war. Rupert, who for Clarry, epitomises Summer. The boys are unfailingly, unflinchingly /kind/ despite their boyhood, and you can feel how much Clarry loves them. Clarry herself is especially lovable, with her determination and stubbornness to not only be as kind as humanly possible, but to get an education and prove that "girls can do anything!" Vanessa, too, is brash and loud and ballsy, but ultimately determined to keep everyone's spirits up during wartime. I also recently blogged about another WWII-related book – Shadow Time Stories by Lilo Beil. What do you think? The Skylarks’ War is a truly wonderful book set before and during World War I. It is about a young girl named Clarry who sends letters to her most loved and only cousin Rupert who joins the army and is then sent to the front line once the Great War breaks out. The story starts when Clarry is born, although not long afterwards her mother dies, leaving poor Clarry and her older brother Peter with a father who would prefer that Clarry had never been born. As the story progresses the characters develop, each having their own personality and problems. I like that when more people are then introduced to the story they all have well-described characters and make the plot much more interesting. As one of our most celebrated birds, in literature, poetry, art and music, the Skylark hardly needs an introduction.

The Skylarks War - Book Review - Nikki Young The Skylarks War - Book Review - Nikki Young

Things didn't get better; they got worse.And all this point-of-view shifting away from Clarry's story gets tangled up with the desire of the boys on the front to spare the people at home generally - everyone's desire to spare Clarry specifically - Peter's rage that Rupert distracts Clarry from her work - and so this book almost feels unsure of what its focus should be. Which leaves Simon, Peter’s friend from boarding school who is different from most, and whose love for Rupert leaves him to enlist and follow him to the Western Front. Hans has two sisters, Lisa and Frieda, who are as annoying to them as sisters always are to two inseparable boys, and there is the ever-present kind, funny Uncle Karl. Erik, in contrast, lives alone with his mother. The English characters

The Skylark declined rapidly from the mid 1970s until the mid 1980s, when the rate of decline slowed. BBS data show further decline, with fluctuations in Scotland and Wales. The BBS map of change in relative density between 1994-96 and 2007-09 indicates that decrease was severe in Northern Ireland and eastern England but that numbers rose in Scotland during that period, especially in the northwest. There has been a decline across Europe since 1980 ( PECBMS: PECBMS 2020a>). I have really enjoyed reading The Skylarks’ War and experiencing the journey of Clarry and her brother. I have a few favourite characters from this story. Clarry is everyone’s favourite character and I too have fallen in love with her. Peter is my second; I love his silly characteristic and his slight pessimistic vibe on occasion. Rupert has to be my absolute favourite as you just cannot help falling in love with this young man. He is portrayed as this idyllic teen and sees the good in almost everything. The provision of grass buffer strips around fields with cereal crops is another agri-environment option which may benefit Skylarks: a study in Sweden found more beetles and spiders in fields with buffer strips and also more Skylarks, but suggested that they may need to be implemented at a landscape scale to be most effective ( Josefsson et al. 2013). Although it’s aimed at children aged 9-12, The Skylarks War is a book that can be enjoyed by children and adults alike. Set in the time leading up to and during the First World War, it is a beautifully written, poignant and moving tale. He was talking about plays in which most of the time, when there was a gay character, they wind up committing suicide or getting beaten to death or sent to prison," Crowley says. "There was always a terrible fate for anybody who was gay. And so, I was determined not to have that happen, here in this."

The Skylarks’ War - Waterstones The Skylarks’ War - Waterstones

A children's story that can only be enjoyed by children is not a good children's story in the slightest." C.S. Lewis It largely follows Peter and Clarry, siblings whose mother died 3 days after Clarry’s birth. Their father never seems to recover from this and is a distant character, a figure in the shadows and one not at all aligned with his children’s wishes. They love him just the same.She considered it a great relief when a few days later she heard that her abandoned husband had caught pneumonia.” Occasionally, very occasionally, you read a book that slips so perfectly into the canon that it seems as if it was always there. That you read it as a child, reread it over and over, until it forms part of you along with Anne Shirley and Jo March, the Fossil sisters, Jo Bettany and Veronica Weston and Nicola Marlowe... the Skylarks' War is such a book. I really enjoyed this book because, unlike other books written about the war, it also focuses on each character’s life before the war starts. I love how the author displays the struggles of a young girl before and during the war.I find Peter very interesting from the lengths he went to, to not have to be sent off to boarding school. I also liked when Peter wanted to go but he then found he wasn’t fit enough. Kate is the quiet youngest child in a family of six children, assiduously writing her diary. Everyone, she notes, is doing something about the war effort. All she can think of doing is to be extraordinarly brave. The adored honorary uncle, Uncle Rupert, comes and goes, bringing fun and presents.