Biography – Autobiography- Memoir

Disguised: A Wartime Memoir

The true story of a girl who posed as a boy during World War II–and dared to speak up for her fellow prisoners of war. With the Japanese army poised to invade their Indonesian island in 1942, Rita la Fontaine’s family knew that they and the other Dutch and Dutch-Indonesian residents would soon become prisoners of war. Fearing that twelve-year-old Rita would be forced to act as a “comfort woman” for the Japanese soldiers, the family launched a desperate plan to turn Rita into “Rick,” cutting her hair short and dressing her in boy’s clothes. Rita’s aptitude for languages earned her a position as translator for the commandant of the prisoner camp, and for the next three years she played a dangerous game of disguise while advocating against poor conditions, injustice, and torture. Sixty-five years later, Rita describes a war experience like no other — a remarkable tale of integrity, fortitude, and honor.

Tasting the Sky: A Palestinian Childhood

In this groundbreaking memoir set in Ramallah during the aftermath of the 1967 Six-Day War, Ibtisam Barakat captures what it is like to be a child whose world is shattered by war. With candor and courage, she stitches together memories of her childhood: fear and confusion as bombs explode near her home and she is separated from her family; the harshness of life as a Palestinian refugee; her unexpected joy when she discovers Alef, the first letter of the Arabic alphabet. This is the beginning of her passionate connection to words, and as language becomes her refuge, allowing her to piece together the fragments of her world, it becomes her true home.

Featured in Volume II, Issue 2 of WOW Review.

Once upon a Full Moon

Elizabeth Quan’s father had made a success in the New World, but he longed for his home in China. So in the early 1920’s, he and his family set out on an arduous trip to the far side of the world. By train, ship, ferry, cart, and on foot, Elizabeth, her parents, and her brothers and sisters set off from Toronto to a village in China to visit the grandmother they have never met.From the mountain of luggage to the whales breaching in the Pacific and geishas on wooden sandals on the cobbled streets of Yokohama, Elizabeth Quan describes sights that would captivate any child. But hers is also a journey of personal discovery. Did she fit in in Canada, where her straight dark hair and even the foods she ate set her apart? Would she fit in in China where she was just as different to the people she met? In the course of her family’s travels she learns that home is a state of mind and that the moon can find us, no matter where we are.

Hidden On The Mountain: Stories Of Children Sheltered From The Nazis In Le Chambon

As the Nazi Army invaded one European country after another at the onset of World War II, desperate Jewish families fled. Their lives were in danger, and many of them had nowhere to turn for help.

Sister Shako and Kolo the Goat : Memories of My Childhood in Turkey

Sister Shako, an old woman whose family was killed in a vendetta, lives with her goats in eastern Turkey. She asks for shelter from Dalokay’s father who was the landlord of the village. The young boy’s friendship with the old woman flourishes with daily visits.

When I Was Little Like You

Mary Malbunka shares her stories of playing with friends, building cubby houses, climbing trees, collecting sugar bag digging for honey ants, hunting for lizards, and learning about the seasons, animals and plants, she creates a vivid picture of a truly Australian childhood in which country-ngurra-is life itself.